Technical Factors: Different Devices

The draft says:
@@ add something to Benefits about multiple versions vs one (accessible) 
version
http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/bcase/tech.html#repurpose

Something about this bothers me (but even after rewriting this message four 
times I'm not sure I'm expressing my concern very well... )

Does anyone really think it is practical to create one page - even a 
properly/carefully/thoughtfully designed page - that can adequately serve a 
wide range of devices without device-specific style-sheets?

In the abstract I still believe this is possible, but the most common 
complaint I hear against the theory is that such a page will produce 
sub-optimal renderings on some target devices.  It begs the questions: is 
it of more benefit from a marketing/customer service standpoint to serve 
pages that are optimized for a range of customer's devices, or will the 
reduction in development and maintenance costs of one page outweigh this 
marketing consideration?

If, on the other hand, what we really mean by "one accessible version" is 
one fixed content package associated with one or more sets of 
device-specific style sheet instructions then we have to be explicit in 
stating this.

I guess I don't have enough confidence in the ability of  current 
user-agents to adequately render even perfectly compliant markup and style 
without author-intervention.

Comments? Discussion? Brick through my window?

Chuck Letourneau

Starling Access Services
"Access A World Of Possibility"

Received on Monday, 2 June 2003 15:37:34 UTC