Re: NIST doing accessibility test suite for 508

Yes, I've contacted her about the article and will be following up to find 
out if they would like to participate more.

Len

At 07:11 PM 11/12/00 -0500, Harvey Bingham wrote:
>"Guidelines for Section 508 Expected by January"
>      http://gcn.com/vol19_no31/news/3178-1.html
>Government Computer News (10/23/00) Vol. 19, No. 31, P. 8; Orr, Tony Lee
>The federal Access Board is due to issue guidelines in January 2001 to 
>help agencies comply with the Section 508 directive. This directive 
>requires that disabled users be able to access IT. Board accessibility 
>specialist Doug Wakefield says that agencies will have six months after 
>the guidelines are issued before the directive goes into effect. However, 
>Wakefield says agencies do not have to wait until the final guidance is 
>issued to begin making sure that their Web sites and other systems are 
>accessible. Wakefield says that agencies must basically make sure that 
>their IT is available to those without vision and those without hearing. 
>However, the board wants to define how much accessibility is suitable. 
>Wakefield says, "Accessibility may be in the eye of the beholder," and 
>notes that the question may boil down to whether a disabled person can 
>access and use a program.
>
>Meanwhile, the National Institute of Standards and Technology is working 
>on establishing metrics that would remove any uncertainty. Sharon Lakowski,
>     laskowski@nist.gov
>manager of the institute's visualization and usability group, says that 
>design and performance must be considered when studying accessibility. 
>Factors such as a Web page's design and a disabled users' ability to 
>complete tasks to his or her satisfaction could be a basis for judging 
>accessibility, Lakowski says. She suggests performance-based user testing 
>to work toward a common industry format.
>
>----
>Has anyone in WAI-ER had any contact with Sharon?
>
>Regards/Harvey Bingham
>

--
Leonard R. Kasday, Ph.D.
Institute on Disabilities/UAP and Dept. of Electrical Engineering at Temple 
University
(215) 204-2247 (voice)                 (800) 750-7428 (TTY)
http://astro.temple.edu/~kasday         mailto:kasday@acm.org

Chair, W3C Web Accessibility Initiative Evaluation and Repair Tools Group
http://www.w3.org/WAI/ER/IG/

The WAVE web page accessibility evaluation assistant: 
http://www.temple.edu/inst_disabilities/piat/wave/