Color+Blindness

**Summer 2011 - Color Blindness and Software design**
posted by Kelly O'Leary

[]

This article, written by Chris Campbell, discusses the struggle that color blind individuals have while using web 2.0 applications. Color deficiency, or color blindness as it’s commonly referred to, doesn’t mean that people with similar conditions cannot see certain colors. A better definition is that certain colors of the visual spectrum look a lot like on another. Color seems to be the easier one to use when defining different information and it can be more time consuming to change the layouts or formats.

The author shares pictures and descriptions of the issues that affect these individuals. He also shares ways for the application creators to make their products less dependent on color. He recommends using different symbols and providing a key to tell what each symbol and color mean. It is important for designers to think twice about their designs. Give your design a once over is a great way to ensure your message is seen and used properly.

Posted by Sherita Locklear (Spring 2012)

Color blindness affects about 10%-15% of the male populations and less than 1% of females; it is believed to be inherited. Those individuals who are affected have trouble with color distinctions, not limited to, but mostly green and red; these colors appear brown to those who are colored blind.

This disability makes interaction with web pages sometimes difficult, especially when individuals have to use colors to interact with web pages and distinguish colors; such as answering questions that are highlighted with red asterisks or refer to material by using red or green colors.

Web designers can assist color blind people by using colors in a more accommodating manner. Firefox has created an add on called ColorBlindExt. There are several different versions of color blindness and not everyone who is affected has difficulty with the same colors. This program allows users to test which category of color blindness that they suffer from and filters the colors based on test results. The down side to this program is that it is not an easy download; it actually takes several steps and certain pages such as media player cannot be filtered.

Individuals who are colored blind usually use websites that accommodate their needs, such as using text or icons instead of colors to interact with the pages. As a web page designer it is beneficial to consider those who have difficulty with colors to allow those with disabilities the same opportunities that are given to those with no disability.

@http://webdesign.about.com/od/accessibility/a/aa062804.htm @http://www.colblindor.com/2007/06/20/colorblindext-better-web-accessibility-for-colorblind-users/