RE: About ccategory- simple data tables with one header

I love the test cases and think continued monitoring of them to SR(s) is great.


Allen Hoffman
Deputy Executive Director
The Office of Accessible Systems & Technology
Department of Homeland Security
202-447-0503 (voice)
allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov<mailto:allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov>

DHS Accessibility Helpdesk
202-447-0440 (voice)
202-447-0582 (fax)
202-447-5857 (TTY)
accessibility@dhs.gov<mailto:accessibility@dhs.gov>

This communication, along with any attachments, is covered by federal and state law governing electronic communications and may contain sensitive and legally privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution, use or copying of this message is strictly prohibited.  If you have received this message in error, please reply immediately to the sender and delete this message.  Thank you.

From: David MacDonald [mailto:david100@sympatico.ca]
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 2:18 PM
To: Hoffman, Allen
Cc: Eric Eggert; Jonathan Avila; w3c-wai-gl@w3.org
Subject: Re: About ccategory- simple data tables with one header

Hi Allen

Assistive technology is overcoming obstacles all the time. That's why WCAG allows text zooming by the browser, without requiring <em> elements.

I get a sense that was very trivial for screen readers to look at adjacent cell headers to determine whether to announce them or not, and therefore overcome the need for Scope in most situations,

However, I honour group consensus. I think the important take away is that for whatever reason, there is some loyalty to the Scope even though it doesn't change the spoken results in any browser/AT combination, except for one very rare use case, which we could document.

I'll drop this for the time being. If someone else wants to bring it up again I would support dropping it. My tests are here along with the rare use case of a row header where it is necessary.
http://davidmacd.com/blog/csun/files/test-scope-tables.html



Cheers,

David MacDonald



CanAdapt Solutions Inc.

Tel:  613.235.4902

LinkedIn<http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmacdonald100>

www.Can-Adapt.com<http://www.Can-Adapt.com>



  Adapting the web to all users
            Including those with disabilities

If you are not the intended recipient, please review our privacy policy<http://www.davidmacd.com/disclaimer.html>

On Mon, Jul 6, 2015 at 8:59 AM, Hoffman, Allen <allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov<mailto:allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov>> wrote:
My problem with the rationale on this is:
Just because screen readers may be doing “magic” analysis to extract information and relationships doesn’t mean such mark up should not be provided.  The idea is to ensure such information and relationships are programmatically determinable, not based on magic analysis, but on intended coding.  Frankly developing SR coding to do magic analysis is not trivial and I’d much prefer SR folks be working on things more specific than interpreting stuff others don’t code well enough.  So, in a nutshell, a SR not working from correctly coded information ,or the other way around should not be used as a yardstick for sufficient techniques or failures.  I do believe tracking real world outcomes of such coding is helpful for AT developers most certainly, and for those who really want to code for a specific environment, but from a systemic approach coders need to code to the standards as best as they can.


Allen Hoffman
Deputy Executive Director
The Office of Accessible Systems & Technology
Department of Homeland Security
202-447-0503<tel:202-447-0503> (voice)
allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov<mailto:allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov>

DHS Accessibility Helpdesk
202-447-0440<tel:202-447-0440> (voice)
202-447-0582<tel:202-447-0582> (fax)
202-447-5857<tel:202-447-5857> (TTY)
accessibility@dhs.gov<mailto:accessibility@dhs.gov>

This communication, along with any attachments, is covered by federal and state law governing electronic communications and may contain sensitive and legally privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution, use or copying of this message is strictly prohibited.  If you have received this message in error, please reply immediately to the sender and delete this message.  Thank you.

From: David MacDonald [mailto:david100@sympatico.ca<mailto:david100@sympatico.ca>]
Sent: Thursday, July 02, 2015 8:58 AM
To: Eric Eggert
Cc: Jonathan Avila; Hoffman, Allen; w3c-wai-gl@w3.org<mailto:w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
Subject: Re: About ccategory- simple data tables with one header

my tests are here
http://davidmacd.com/blog/csun/files/test-scope-tables.html

results table at the bottom of the page


Cheers,

David MacDonald



CanAdapt Solutions Inc.

Tel:  613.235.4902<tel:613.235.4902>

LinkedIn<http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmacdonald100>

www.Can-Adapt.com<http://www.Can-Adapt.com>



  Adapting the web to all users
            Including those with disabilities

If you are not the intended recipient, please review our privacy policy<http://www.davidmacd.com/disclaimer.html>

On Thu, Jul 2, 2015 at 6:33 AM, David MacDonald <david100@sympatico.ca<mailto:david100@sympatico.ca>> wrote:
HI Eric

I hope you don't mind me pursuing this a little more thoroughly. Could you provide a link to the tests they conducted, the tables they used and a list of AT that was used? I'm having trouble reconciling their findings with mine.

I think it's really important to get this right. To require a million developers to add 50 million instances of scope to web sites all over the world is a lot to ask, and I think it behoves us to make sure we have our testing right.


Cheers,

David MacDonald



CanAdapt Solutions Inc.

Tel:  613.235.4902<tel:613.235.4902>

LinkedIn<http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmacdonald100>

www.Can-Adapt.com<http://www.Can-Adapt.com>



  Adapting the web to all users
            Including those with disabilities

If you are not the intended recipient, please review our privacy policy<http://www.davidmacd.com/disclaimer.html>

On Thu, Jul 2, 2015 at 3:15 AM, Eric Eggert <ee@w3.org<mailto:ee@w3.org>> wrote:

On 1 Jul 2015, at 23:55, David MacDonald wrote:

Tests I've done in recent years didn't come up with any advantage to adding
scope row or scope of column... Has anybody found any design situations
when recent versions of JAWS or NVDA have any trouble when the scope on the
row or column header.

In the old days it was necessary because moving from the second row up to
the first column header row would cause the screen reader to read every
<th> to the left of the cell....

Hi David,

We had people in EO WG using the tables with current Jaws and NVDA and they
reported an increase in accessibility when using scope. Especially the problem you describe, reading multiple <th> was an issue.

We agreed to use scope and recommend people to use scope on most tables to avoid ambiguity. The tutorials need convey clear actionable accessibility instructions that are easy to follow. If people need to think a lot about how to approach something, they’ll likely do what is less effort and/or complexity.

Best,
Eric

Cheers,

David MacDonald

CanAdapt Solutions Inc.

Tel: 613.235.4902<tel:613.235.4902>

LinkedIn http://www.linkedin.com/in/davidmacdonald100


www.Can-Adapt.com<http://www.Can-Adapt.com>

  *   Adapting the web to all users*
  *   Including those with disabilities*

If you are not the intended recipient, please review our privacy policy
http://www.davidmacd.com/disclaimer.html


On Wed, Jul 1, 2015 at 9:28 AM, Jonathan Avila jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com<mailto:jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com>
wrote:

From the HTML5 Spec
http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/tabular-data.html#the-th-element


The row keyword, which maps to the row state

The row state means the header cell applies to some of the subsequent
cells in the same row(s).

From HTML 4.01 Tables Section
http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/struct/tables.html


row: The current cell provides header information for the rest of the row
that contains it (see also the section on table directionality).

Jonathan

--

Jonathan Avila

Chief Accessibility Officer

SSB BART Group

jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com<mailto:jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com>

Phone 703.637.8957<tel:703.637.8957>

Follow us: Facebook | Twitter | LinkedIn | Blog | Newsletter

-----Original Message-----
From: Hoffman, Allen [mailto:allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov<mailto:allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov>]
Sent: Wednesday, July 01, 2015 9:19 AM
To: Jonathan Avila; w3c-wai-gl@w3.org<mailto:w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
Subject: RE: About ccategory- simple data tables with one header

Is the HTML specification for scope clear on the applicability of =row
only pointing right? Is it differently scoped in HTML4 vs. 5? Can you
point to it? Interesting stuff for sure.

Allen Hoffman

Deputy Executive Director

The Office of Accessible Systems & Technology Department of Homeland
Security

202-447-0503<tel:202-447-0503> (voice)

allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov<mailto:allen.hoffman@hq.dhs.gov>

DHS Accessibility Helpdesk

202-447-0440<tel:202-447-0440> (voice)

202-447-0582<tel:202-447-0582> (fax)

202-447-5857<tel:202-447-5857> (TTY)

accessibility@dhs.gov<mailto:accessibility@dhs.gov>

This communication, along with any attachments, is covered by federal and
state law governing electronic communications and may contain sensitive and
legally privileged information. If the reader of this message is not the
intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination,
distribution, use or copying of this message is strictly prohibited. If
you have received this message in error, please reply immediately to the
sender and delete this message. Thank you.

-----Original Message-----

From: Jonathan Avila [mailto:jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com<mailto:jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com>
jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com<mailto:jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com>]

Sent: Wednesday, July 01, 2015 9:13 AM

To: w3c-wai-gl@w3.org<mailto:w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>

Subject: RE: About ccategory- simple data tables with one header

There are just some situations where no cell acts as a row header. In
these situations there is no header cell and thus no need to indicate a row
header. Also of important note is the fact that the scope="row" attribute
only applies to subsequent cells. Thus, if scope = row is applied to cells
in a header column such as the 3rd column then by definition in the HTML
specification it does not apply cells in the columns before it. This can
be problematic in that it forces developers to organize columns in a
certain way or forces developers to use ids and headers.

Also of confusion in the tutorial is the use of scope in examples with ids
and headers. There is no advice on whether use of scope alongside ids and
headers is wrong or required.

http://www.w3.org/WAI/tutorials/tables/multi-level/


The tutorial also incorrectly states "By using the row value for scope
assigns the header cells in the second column to data cells on the left and
the right of the individual header cell." When in fact it only applies to
the right in LTR languages.

I do agree, it would be great to give clear guidance on when scope of row
is required and not and what to do with header columns that are not in the
first column as well as issues with using scope and id/headers together.

Jonathan

--

Jonathan Avila

Chief Accessibility Officer

SSB BART Group

jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com<mailto:jon.avila@ssbbartgroup.com>

Phone 703.637.8957<tel:703.637.8957>

Follow us: Facebook | Twitter | LinkedIn | Blog | Newsletter

-----Original Message-----

From: Sailesh Panchang [mailto:spanchang02@yahoo.com<mailto:spanchang02@yahoo.com>
spanchang02@yahoo.com<mailto:spanchang02@yahoo.com>]

Sent: Sunday, June 28, 2015 7:41 AM

To: w3c-wai-gl@w3.org<mailto:w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>

Subject: About ccategory- simple data tables with one header

Here is an appeal: please reconsider the need to single out "Tables with
one header " as a separate category of simple tables in the tutorial [1].
If retained, revise the situations where they are suitable and the
corresponding examples.

A simple data table must have both row and column headers marked up. There
are perhaps very specific instances when this is not the case:

e.g. 1: A calendar grid typically has a row containing days of week
(column headers) and no row header column.

e.g. 2: The first column of a two-column data table has row identifiers or
row headers. The table may be devoid of a column header row.

The smallness of a table with data itself being distinctly different in
each column as stated in the tutorial [1] does not justify absence of row
headers for those tables.

I am still looking for answers posed in my emails below:

https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-eo-editors/2015Jun/0041.html


https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-eo-editors/2015Jun/0033.html


[1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/tutorials/tables/one-header/


Thanks,

Sailesh Panchang

--

Eric Eggert
Web Accessibility Specialist
Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) at Wold Wide Web Consortium (W3C)