Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Accessibility and findability of local e-government websites in the Czech Republic

  • Long Paper
  • Published:
Universal Access in the Information Society Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

This article focuses on the accessibility of local e-government web pages. Accessibility is herein considered in a broader perspective, taking also into account that information must be findable within the Internet through conventional fulltext search engines. Based on this assumption, an analysis of 39 local e-government websites in the Czech Republic was carried out in two testing periods (March 2006 and April 2008). The web pages were analysed both from a citizen’s point of view (with disadvantage due to disability or to technical equipment) and from the point of view of fulltext search engines. In the analysis of results, there is an overall evaluation and comparison between testing periods and recommendations for improvement of the current conditions.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. As of February 1, 2008 the Watchfire WebXact and Bobby Online products are no longer publicly available.

  2. The number of classes was calculated by Sturgers’s rule.

  3. Decision Tree Algorithm.

References

  1. Act No. 365/2000 of September 14, 2000 on public administration information systems

  2. Act No. 81/2006 Coll. of February 10, 2006, amending the Act No. 365/2000 Coll., on public administration information systems and on changes in some other Acts as amended, and other relevant acts

  3. Berners-Lee, T.: Web architecture from 50,000 feet. Created: 1998 [online]. [cit. 2008-07-05]. Available at http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/Architecture.html

  4. Czech Helsinki Committee: [online]. [quoted 2006-5-12]. Available at <http://www.helcom.cz/index.php?p=2&rid=78&cid=197l>

  5. De Jong, M., Lentz, L.: Municipalities on the web: user-friendliness of government information on the Internet. Lecture notes in computer science—electronic government, vol. 4084, pp. 174–185 (2006), ISBN 978-3-540-37686-6

  6. Fangs—screen reader emulator: [online]. [cit. 2008-05-12]. Available at <http://sourceforge.net/projects/fangs/>

  7. Goette, T., Collier, C., White, J.D.: An exploratory study of the accessibility of state government Web sites. Univers Access Inf Soc 5(1), 41–50 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Google Toolbar for Firefox version 2.0: [online]. [cit. 2006-4-9]. Available at: <http://www.google.com/tools/firefox/toolbar/index.html>

  9. HiSoftware® Cynthia says™ portal [online]. 2003, 2006 [cit. 2006-05-21]. Available at <http://www.contentquality.com/>

  10. Hölscher, C.H., Strube, G.: Web search behavior of internet experts and newbies. Comp. Netw. 33(1), 337–346 (2000)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. iProspect offline channel influence on online search behavior study. Research study, iProspect (2007)

  12. Ivory, M., Chevalier, A.: A study of automated web site evaluation tools, technical report UWCSE-02-10-01, University of Washington, Department of Computer Science and Engineering (2002)

  13. Ivory, M.Y., Mankoff, J., Le, L.: Using automated tools to improve web site usage by users with diverse abilities. Inf. Technol. Soc. 3(1), 195–236 (2003)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Janovsky, D.: Zahadny Google Toolbar PageRank [online]. Lupa.cz, 2005, 25. 1. 2005 [cit. 2006-10-20]. Available at <http://www.lupa.cz/clanky/zahadny-google-toolbar-pagerank/>. ISSN 1213-0702

  15. Lazar, J., Beere, P., Greenidge, K., Nagappoa, Y.: Web accessibility in the Mid-atlantic United States: a study of 50 homepages. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 2, 331–341 (2003)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Leitner, M.H., Schiestl, S., Seliger, T.: Practical application of WAI guidelines in Web design: database and expert systems applications, 871–875 (2005). doi:10.1109/DEXA.2005.155

  17. Mankoff, J., Fait, H., Tran, T.: Is your web page accessible? A comparative study of methods for assessing web page accessibility for the blind. Proceedings of the SIGCHI conference on human factors in computing systems, April 02-07, 2005, Portland, Oregon, USA

  18. MEAC—assessment of the status of eAccessibility in Europe. Main report, Bonn, October 2007. [online]. [cit. 2008-07-15]. Available at <http://www.eaccessibility-progress.eu/key-results-of-meac/>

  19. Morville, P.: Ambient findability—what we find changes who we become. O’Reilly, 204 p, (2005), ISBN: 9780596007652

  20. Page Rank on Wikipedia. [online]. [cit. 2008-06-07]. Available at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PageRank> (2008)

  21. Paris, M.: Website accessibility: a survey of local e-government websites and legislation in Northern Ireland. Univers. Access Inf. Soc. 4, 292–299 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Pernice, K.P., Nielsen, J.: Beyond ALT text: making the web easy to use for users with disabilities,” Nielsen, Norman Group, October, Available at: <http://www.nngroup.com/reports/accessibility/> (2001)

  23. Pristupnost webu instituci statni spravy [online]. Dobry web, [cit. 2006-11-25]. Available at <http://www.dobryweb.cz/pristupnost-statni-spravy/> (2004)

  24. Recommended DTDs to use in your Web document. [online]. [cit. 2006-11-21]. Available at <http://www.w3.org/QA/2002/04/valid-dtd-list.html> (2006)

  25. Resolution by the Government of the Czech Republic of June 18, 2003 No. 596+P to the report of the fulfilment of the national plan on equalization of opportunities for persons with disabilities in 2002

  26. SEO: [online]. [cit. 2005-18-2]. Available at: <http://www.h1.cz/seo>

  27. W3C markup validation service [online]. [cit. 2008-06-02]. Available at <http://validator.w3.org> (2008)

  28. White, B.: Web accessibility, mobility, and findability. Proceedings of the IEEE first Latin American web congress, LA-WEB 2003. November 10–12, pp. 239–241, Santiago de Chile (2003)

Download references

Acknowledgments

The work reported in this paper was conducted with the kind support of the Grant Agency of the Czech Republic, grant No. 402/09/0219.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of System Engineering and Informatics, Faculty of Economics and Administration, University of Pardubice, Studentska 84, 532 10, Pardubice, Czech Republic

    Hana Kopackova, Karel Michalek & Karel Cejna

Authors
  1. Hana Kopackova
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Karel Michalek
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Karel Cejna
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hana Kopackova.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Kopackova, H., Michalek, K. & Cejna, K. Accessibility and findability of local e-government websites in the Czech Republic. Univ Access Inf Soc 9, 51–61 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-009-0159-y

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10209-009-0159-y

Keywords

Search

Navigation