Regulation is a law, rule, or other order prescribed by authority, to regulate conduct. Regulation involves legal issues.
Compliance refers to conforming to a rule, such as a specification, policy, standard or law for example SOX compliance is for finance related information to prevent WorldCom type frauds.
Compliance for a web site refers to complying to different standards as listed by W3C or the World Wide Web Consortium. W3C are the primary standards body for the web, and have defined a precise specification for how the HTML (or XHTML) of a website should be written to ensure compatibility, accessibility and follow best practice. W3C compliance is therefore a widely adopted test with many benefits.
Benefits
As a general rule, web sites which are W3C complaint will
- work more consistently across web browsers
- be more accessible and usable
- work on non-standard devices, such as mobile phones and televisions
- generally rank better in search engines.
Online tools – Various online tools are present to check compliance to W3C standards and include tools for validating HTML, CSS, accessibility, mobile friendliness and screen readers which are
Validation tools – Validation tools are used to check the code for standards compliance. HTML validators , CSS validators and broken link (or dead links) checkers are a few such tools. Following URLs point to some validation tools:
- http://validator.w3.org (HTML)
- http://jigsaw.w3.org/css-validator/ (CSS)
- http://validator.w3.org/checklink/ (Broken Links)
Accessibility – Accessibility is an important idea behind many web standards. Designing accessible websites will help in creating an inclusive digital world. Accessibility compliance of the Website may be checked at
- http://wave.webaim.org/
- http://www.stanford.edu/group/accessibility/cgi-bin/accessibilitychecker/checker/index.php
- http://www.etre.com/tools/accessibilitycheck/
Mobile friendliness – Mobile devices are providing alternate and easy connectivity to Internet. Reach of your website will increase with its availability on mobile devices. Mobile-friendliness of your website may be checked at
- http://validator.w3.org/mobile/
Assistive Technologies – Assistive Technologies are meant to cater to the needs of people with various impairments like Visual, Hearing, Mobility, and Learning impairment. An assistive technology helps differently abled people in rendering or viewing a webpage. Screen Readers are assistive devices that convert text into synthesized speech to facilitate visually impaired users to listen to and comprehend the content on a webpage. Following URL can be visited to get more information about assistive technologies and screen readers
- http://www.screenreader.net
- http://www.gwmicro.com
Screen Reader Access – The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 level AA, enables people with visual impairments access the website using assistive technologies, such as screen readers. The information of the website is accessible with different screen readers, such as JAWS, NVDA, SAFA, Supernova and Window-Eyes.
