Technology Services

Website Policies

All Indiana University School of Informatics at IUPUI Web pages must comply with local, state, and federal laws and School, campus, and university policies and standards.

The purpose of these policies and standards is to ensure that the School is represented with consistency and integrity on the Web sites of all School of Informatics’ departments, programs, offices, and research centers.

Any questions or comments about these policies should be addressed to Nate Garrett.

Accessibility

All portions of Indiana University’s Web sites are required by Title 2 of the Americans with Disabilities Act to be fully accessible to everyone. For a thorough explanation of accessibility design guidelines, see W3C References on Web Accessibility.

To meet accessibility standards, all Indiana University Web pages must employ at least these general accessibility strategies:

Provide alternative text for all photos and graphics.
Provide text alternatives for multimedia (Flash, video, and audio).
Provide a link to a longer description for graphics that present important information, such as charts, graphical tables, and diagrams.
Provide a description for each link in an image map.
Ensure that your site is usable with images, JavaScript, and/or CSS disabled.
Validate HTML, scripts, and CSS to be free of errors.
Only use relative font sizes (percentages or ems).
Make sure there is sufficient contrast between text and background colors.
Whenever possible, use sans-serif fonts for body text with sufficient letter and line spacing.

Visual Identity Standards

All Web pages should use the Informatics Web template. This template is fully compliant with IU’s Visual Identity standards. Through this template each department, program, and research center has been assigned a color based on its area of study.

- Life Science (Bioinformatics, Health Informatics, and Health Information Administration) will use Olive (HEX #808A53).
- Human-Computer Interaction will use Midnight (HEX #2D637F).
- Media Arts & Science will use Violet (HEX #7F2D46).
- Informatics will use Leather (HEX #C78036).

The Arial typeface should be used for all hypertext.

The Web-safe hex value of IU Crimson (#990000) should be used for all hypertext links in the main content area of Web pages. No other copy or headers within the main content area should appear red. This makes a clear distinction between links and text.

All Web pages should CSS for page layout, font size, font color, background color, spacing, and line-height.

Avoid using animated images or blinking or scrolling text. These features present difficulties for individuals with visual impairments or cognitive disabilities that interfere with concentration.

Avoid using background elements that compete with or obscure the page’s information elements. Even a subtle background graphic can make content difficult to read, so the use of a graphic element as a background should be undertaken with discretion, if at all. The combination that has proven most readable and satisfying for users is black text on a white background.

Ensure that all textual elements (and all essential graphical elements) are printable. Users who are reading a hard copy must be able to view all essential information on the printed page. Keep in mind that many users have browsers that don’t print background images or colors by default (or this feature may be manually disabled).

If possible, limit the total size of graphics to less than 40K. Long download times are a major deterrent to continued use of a Web page.

Whenever possible, use a fluid page width. If a fixed width must be used, all vital information (such as navigation, content, and any search functionality) should be viewable within 1024 pixels. When designing a fixed-width site, it is recommended that you set the minimum width to 760 pixels and the maximum width to 955. This takes into consideration the width of the browser’s vertical scrollbar and keeps the horizontal scrollbar from appearing for users at or above 1024 pixels when the browser is maximized. Pages that will be viewed in OneStart should be no wider than 640 pixels.

All Web pages must display properly in the following browsers: Internet Explorer 7 (Windows), Internet Explorer 8 (Windows), Firefox (Windows & Mac), and Safari (Mac).

Content

The primary content of any page should be developed to meet the needs of its users. In keeping with established usability practices and adopted Indiana University style, Web pages must also conform to the following conventions:

Make sure every page includes the appropriate metadata.

- Use the page heading as the document title. It is important that the page heading accurately describes the content of the page. This will ensure the document appears at the highest possible level on search results pages. Accurate titles will also provide clear cues to those who bookmark the page.
- The page’s keywords meta tag must contain the full name of the university campus (e.g., Indiana University Northwest) and the geographic location (e.g., Gary, Indiana). Metadata helps search engines find the page and provides information on authorship, copyright, and the software used to create the page.

The appropriate IU or campus banner must appear at the top of every page.

The home page navigation should contain main category headings that clearly define what information is available on the site. Headings should be inclusive, definitive, and unambiguous.

Every page should include the IU search engine. Place both a search link and a search box on the home page. For instructions on how to include the IU search engine, reference the IU search documentation.

If there is a permanent daily “news” area on the campus home page, it should contain a maximum of three news blurbs of 50 or fewer words each.

All pages should be free of jargon and obscure or undefined acronyms.

All content should be carefully proofread, spell-checked, and grammar-checked using the IU Style Guide. Technological language usage and terminology must conform to the UITS Standard Terms List.

Footer

All IU Web pages must include a footer that is set apart from the body of the page with a hard rule, paragraph separator, or other distinguishing method. At a minimum, the footer should contain:

The Block IU or IUPUI: Available for download on this site.
Indiana University trustee copyright statement: The word “copyright” should serve as a link to the Indiana University copyright statement page, followed by the copyright symbol and year the content of the page was developed and published to the Web. Directly following should be the phrase, “The Trustees of Indiana University,” with the words “Indiana University” linked to the IU gateway Web site.
Copyright infringement link: The phrase “Copyright Complaints” should be linked to the Indiana University copyright infringement page. This link should follow the Indiana University trustee copyright statement and be separated with a comma.

Domain Names

Sub domains of informatics.iupui.edu will only be permitted for School sponsored departments, programs, offices, and research centers.

Designer domains are domain names that do not have an IU association included in the name (e.g., centeroncongress.org, or others in the .NET or .INFO domains). Use of such names will only be allowed in the following cases, subject to these limitations:

For .ORG, the entity represented by the Web page or server being named must be a nonprofit, non-commercial academic agency, institute, or program, which is supported by a consortium comprised of an IU department or office of IU and at least five nonprofit organizations external to IU.
For .NET, the service represented by the Web page or server being named must be part of a set (i.e., a network) of similar external Web pages or servers.
For .INFO, the service represented must provide an outlet for information that has an outside market and is uniquely possessed by a particular IU department or agency.

Commercial (.COM) domains are generally not permitted in the IU technology environment. IU entities that have a reason to use .COM naming (either on university-owned computers or using services of an external provider) must submit business plans to the IU E-Commerce Task Force for review by Treasury Operations and Financial Management Services. UITS will not permit .COM naming for activities not governed by the processes and procedures of Treasury Operations and Financial Management Services.

All domain name requests must be approved by the Webmaster. To submit a request for a domain name, please use the Technology Services Request Form.

Production Web Server Use

The production Web server is to only be used for Web sites of the School, its departments, programs, and research centers. In addition Web sites hosted on the production Web server are only to be used for marketing and communication purposes. No research activities are to be conducted on the production Web server.

Personal sites and individual lab Web sites are not to be hosted on the production Web server. These Web sites can be hosted on a UITS Webserve account.

Web Updates

All Web updates will be made by a member of the Web & Communications Team. To submit a request, submit the appropriate form on the Technology Services page.