Web Publishing Guidelines
Adopted February 15, 2001
The creation, maintenance, and content of World Wide Web sites at the UNT Health Science Center are governed by the University of North Texas Health Science Center Web Policy. Since World Wide Web sites are defined as state publications, they must also conform to Texas State policy. These Guidelines were written to assist Web authors in interpreting these and associated policies, and to highlight some of the more important and/or most frequently overlooked design issues.
POLICY GUIDELINES
Ownership
An "owner" is defined as "a person responsible for a business function; and for determining controls and access to information resources supporting that business function. " Texas Department of Information Resources. (I TAC 201.13(b) G.3 Information Security Standards, Adopted August 13, 1998.)
All owners and others responsible for developing Web documents are required to adhere to all applicable state and federal regulations and UNT Health Science Center policies and guidelines associated with accessibility, security, risk measures, and copyright.
Privacy
All UNT Health Science Center Web sites must provide a Privacy Statement on their top-level web page (also called home or index pages). Each Privacy Statement must identify the information collected from site visitors, describe its use, and assure site visitors of the integrity of their information during transmission and storage.
Each Privacy Statement must identify both passive and active information collected from site visitors and describe its use. Passive information is collected without alerting the site visitor, while Active information is that purposely provided by the site visitor.
Examples of passive information include:
- browser detection: browser type and browser version
- remote host name: the DNS entry for the computer accessing the web site
- cookies: hidden identifiers used to store data during a visit, and cumulatively over time.
Examples of active information include:
- name, address, or social security number of the site visitor
- email address of the site visitor
- comments or answers to questions provided by the site visitor
Security of Private Information
Each web site at UNT Health Science Center will assure site visitors of the integrity of their information, in transit and in storage. This assurance should include whether or not the data is encrypted in transit via Secure Socket Layers (SSL) or Transport Layer Security (TLS), the positions or UNT Health Science Center employees that will be able to access the information, and under what conditions that information will be accessed.
The UNT Health Science Center has special responsibilities to protect students information under the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA). Therefore, any UNT Health Science Center Web site collecting data falling under FERPA guidelines must carefully review its handling of such data and insure that its procedures adhere to the act.
Commercial Sales, Solicitations and Advertisements via UNT Health Science Center Department or Organization Web Pages
All commercial sales, solicitations or advertisements by UNT Health Science Center departments or organizations, including student organizations, on UNT Health Science Center web sites must reflect the mission and purpose of the UNT Health Science Center and conform with its contract policy. A formal contract between a commercial organization and the UNT Health Science Center must be in place before a sale, solicitation, or advertisement is published on a UNT Health Science Center Web page unless the sale is of products produced by academic or administrative departments within the UNT Health Science Center.
Before posting advertising or solicitations, student organizations, alumni associations, the UNT Health Science Center Foundation, and other affiliated or outside organizations with web pages hosted by the University must receive written permission from the Information Resources Steering Committee (IRSC) through submission to the Information Resources Working Group (IRWG). Such advertising or solicitations must have a demonstrable benefit to the health science center for approval.
Unauthorized solicitations by individuals for commercial or personal gain are prohibited.
Corporate logos and external links advertising products under a contract may not exceed 10% of any web page as viewed on a single computer screen. Exemptions to the use of corporate logos and/or advertising may be made in designing UNT Health Science Center Web sites that provide links to free software downloads that provide necessary functionality for viewing Web content, such as Adobe Acrobat files and RealVideo streaming video files.
Accessibility, Web Page Standards, HTML Coding Requirements, and Common Links to Information and Resources
UNT Health Science Center Web pages must conform to the State of Texas World Wide Web Design Standards and Coding Guidelines that specify certain Web page design criteria (http://www.dir.state.tx.us/standards/srrpub11.htm).
DESIGN GUIDELINES
1. Use the UNT Health Science Center word mark on each home page.
The UNT Health Science Center's word mark provides continuity and cohesiveness to the many Web sites on the campus. It is necessary that each home page indicate the UNT Health Science Center's name in the word mark format, which is the UNT Health Science Center's name in a special form (Images approved by Marketing and Communications or Biomedical Communications to assure web-readiness). For text-only browsing, an alternate tag with the UNT Health Science Center's name should be provided with the link to the word mark image file. Various sizes of the word mark image are located at http://www.hsc.unt.edu/logos.
2. Sign each home page with the name and title of person responsible for the document.
It is important that you identify who is responsible for the content, and that you provide any copyright information, if there is any. In some cases, you may want to reference both the author of the original document and the person who is responsible for the electronic version. You should include the following:
- The name of the person in your department who can answer questions about information found on the Web site.
- The complete telephone number of the contact person.
- The physical address of your department (your building and office number, etc.).
- The mailing address of your department if its different from the physical address.
- The e-mail address of someone who will respond to questions about your Web site (and be sure that someone at that address checks for messages frequently)!
3. Review the information on your Web site regularly and date each page to show when it was created, updated, or reviewed.
"Owners" of information on the Web site must routinely review the official information placed on the Web to ensure its timeliness and accuracy. The frequency with which you should review the content will vary by the type of information it contains, but remember that users expect to find recent, correct information about the UNT Health Science Center on our Web site.
Be realistic about what you are able to publish and maintain on the Web. Review the links on each of your pages at least every month and update links and contents as needed. Software to perform the link checking is available to assist with that task. Check with the UNTHSC Web Administrators for recommendations about the best product to use.
Putting the date on the page tells them when the site was last updated so they have some indication whether to trust the information or not. Spell out the date (i.e., Last updated/reviewed on April 20, 2000). While the United States uses month/day/year, the rest of the world uses day/month/year so it is best to spell out the date to avoid confusion.
Check the spelling and grammar on all material before you publish it on the Web -poor spelling and bad grammar give a very negative impression of an educational institution!
4. Include internal navigation links on your pages.
Some people might go directly to a page on your Web site through a Web search or by following links from off campus, so you should make it easy for them to find additional information about your department or the university. Departmental home pages must link to the UNT Health Science Center home page (http://www.hsc.unt.edu). All other Web pages should have links that take the user back to the departmental home page or to the UNT Health Science Center home page. You should also consider linking to UNT Health Science Center site search page (http://www.hsc.unt.edu/search/default.cfm) so that users can easily search within the UNT Health Science Center site for additional information.
Any UNT Health Science Center Web document may provide access to any official information that is on the Web, but this should be accomplished by a link to the information, rather than a duplicate copy of that information. In other words, managers of Web documents should not duplicate information that they do not manage, but instead should refer the reader to the original copy.
Include a feedback link on each Web page for comments, suggestions, and corrections. Visitors to your Web page may have questions or comments and if you make it easy for them to contact you, they are more likely to have a positive impression of your Web page as well as of the UNT Health Science Center.
5. Design your page for accessibility.
State and Federal regulations require that Web pages comply with certain accessibility standards. The State has Web Accessibility Guidelines at http://www.dir.state.tx.us/standards/srrpub11-accessibility.htm that are very helpful in assuring that your Web pages serve all visitors to your site. Look at that site for specific requirements, but some of the key points to remember are:
- Avoid the use of frames unless you are an advanced designer who can assure no priority 1 or 2 accessibility errors (see the site above for definitions of these terms) occur when persons with visual impairments use your site. Although there are some instances where the use of frames is necessary, usually frames are used to provide consistent navigation and provide a framework for the site. Several alternatives to frames provide consistent navigation without decreasing the usability of the site.
- Keep the load time for your Web pages short, generally less than 20 seconds using a 28.8 Kbps modem (and remember that images contribute to the download time of your pages, and that images can be large files).
- Keep graphics small in both size and number to reduce the load time for your site, especially over dial-up lines. Various UNTHSC logos may be found at http://www.hsc.unt.edu/images/. Also, remember that most clip art is copyrighted and you must obtain permission before using it. If you do use it with permission, give the proper credit to the artwork by showing the owner's name.
- Assign alt tags to all images, including images such as horizontal lines, graphical bullets, image maps, and hot spots. The alt tags should describe the content of the graphic, but if the images do not convey content, simply use a "null tag" ("alt = " "). Otherwise the images will cause confusion with speech readers.
- If you post document image files (such as Adobe PDF files) to your site, you must also provide accessible versions of those same pages that will work with screen readers (a few document types are exempt from this state rule see TAC 201.12.b.1.C.) Provide a link on your pages to the site where users can obtain free copies of the software needed to view the document image files.
- If you require the use of special plug-ins (such as "Flash") to Web browsers that defeat the functionality of screen readers, provide an alternate way of obtaining the information, such as plain text.
6. Link to the UNT Health Science Center's affirmative action, equal opportunity employer and Americans with Disabilities statement or abbreviation.
Each college or department home page should have a link to the Health Science Centers AA/EOE/ADA statement or abbreviation, which can be found at: http://www.hsc.unt.edu/policies/aaeoeada.cfm.
7. Add required metatags to each page.
The State requires that every Web page meeting the definition of a state publication, which includes most UNT Health Science Center pages, have four tags added to enhance their retrievability:
- Title page topic or subject (if you have a standard title tag for your page already, you do not need to duplicate it as a metatag).
- Description brief description of the subjects covered.
- Keywords topic words specific to the page subject, not to exceed 25 words.
- Author including "State of Texas" and "University of North Texas Health Science Center", and your departments name if appropriate.
8. If you collect data about the visitors to your site (including logging hits), the State of Texas requires that you include a Privacy Statement on your home page as well as on each page where that information is collected (especially forms). You must also be sure to protect the security of any sensitive data you collect.
Refer to the Privacy and Security policies associated with Web page development given above for more specific information.
