Can overcoming missing and muddled use cases conquer inaccessibility?
We have argued in “Are missing, muddled use cases the cause of web inaccessibility?” posting that the main culprit in web usability is not technical accessibility but the way use cases are represented, tangled, and obscured by links as well as graphics and widgets on web pages. A use case describes a sequence of actions performed to meet a specific goal, such as “register on a web site” or “archive e-mail messages”. Use cases not only lay out actions but also provide the rationale, the consequences, constraints, and error recovery procedures for interactions. Our claim is that software developers, both desktop and web application developers, force all users, sighted or blind, to infer the use cases from the page contents and layouts, often embellished with links, such as blog rolls, to enhance social interaction and increase search engine rankings. Reports such as those from the Web Insight project and the Nielsen Norman report “Beyond ALT text” describe in gory detail the frustrations
