Re: EOWG: Substantially updated Standards Harmonization document

Good morning EOWG friends,

First, I would like to congratulate the editors of this new version for a job well-done. Reading through it all, I am happy to say that I can now fully support the document, even though I work for a government that decided to take the fragmentation path. I'll even go as far as to say that if such a document had been available four years ago, I might have been able to convince the government officials I worked for that fragmentation was a bad idea. This is how good I think this is.

While I understand the risks related to standards fragmentation, I still believe we managed to create one in Quebec that does not jeopardize web accessibility in the long run. This document doesn't exclude that possibility, so I'm happy with it and wasn't asking for more. I'm glad you accepted my proposals to change some of the passages in the text to reflect upon that.

I am very comfortable with this document going as is. All the problems I had with it are gone and the new structure of the document makes it a much easier read, which can only help get the message across to the next governments that will be tempted by an accessibility policy of some sort.

I did however, pick up a few typos along the way:

“standards fragmentation”—use of divergent : missing a space before and after the "—"
standards—can slow potential : missing a space before and after the "—"
"mpossible" : missing an "i" in the 3rd paragraph of the introduction section
"or screen magnifiers Divergent standards" : missing a period after "magnifiers" in last bullet of Fragmentation concerns section

I will not be able to make it to the meetings tomorrow and next week as those are national holidays here in Quebec. I'll try to send in comments on the business case slides as well before the end of the day.

Best regards,

-- 
Denis Boudreau, président
Coopérative AccessibilitéWeb 
1751 rue Richardson, bureau 6111 
Montréal (Qc), Canada H3K 1G6 
Téléphone : +1 877.315.5550 







On 2011-06-23, at 5:29 AM, Wayne Dick wrote:

> Hi All,
> 
> The Harmonization Survey is not open yet.  So, here are my comments.
> 
> There is a little word smithing that may or may not be worth
> reporting. Most of the rest is good to go.  I suggest one real change.
> 
> "In addition to these fundamental principles, WCAG 2.0 includes  ... following:
> 
> Then follows 4 guidelines that look like they were chosen at random.
> It seems less arbitrary and not so much more space to just paste in
> WCAG 2.0 at a glance.  We don't have 100% agreement on final language
> yet, so I would leave final word smithing to the editors taste.
> 
> Otherwise, I like the document.  Local governments may cringe at the
> prospect of letting someone else do it for them, but that is what we
> want them to do.  The chances that a rewrite of WCAG 2.0 will yield a
> better document are tiny.  Look at how much work it took us.
> 
> At first I felt uncomfortable with Judy's bold assertions to just do
> it our way, but really it makes sense.
> 
> The document does not address how to extend WCAG 2 to cover mistakes,
> and this will lead to fragmentation, but we'll probably learn from
> that too.
> 
> Wayne
>