WEB DESIGN GARAGE [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

Managing Your Use of Color

Color is invaluable as a design tool. You use it to call attention to certain elements on your page. You use it to distinguish one type of content from another type. However, color is just as much a visual element as an image, so, as an accessibility-minded Web builder, you need to be careful about how you use it. After all, many your visitors are colorblind.

Take the example in Figure 6.1. Notice how the underline helps you spot a link in this block of text. However, if you remove the underline, as in Figure 6.2, you have no way of telling where the text ends and the hyperlinks begin.

So, while color is an effective visual cue or indicator for an element such as a hyperlink, it shouldn't be the only visual cue you provide. By all means, use color to call attention to elements on your page. Just make sure you send the color in with some backup. Use an underline, a solid border, an arrow symbol, boldface, italicsanything that translates to a black-and-white environment, as in Figure 6.3.