Re: making the draft for CR accurate

I agree with Andrew.  Current text is better. 



There are many provisions in WCAG 2.0 that address cognitive.   Working with John Slatin we documented this — and then updated it as we added more.

Did WCAG 2.0 cover cognitive, language, and learning disabilities ?   No 

Did WCAG 2.0 cover any disabilities?  No

Are some disabilities covered better than others?   Yes

Why is this so? 
ONLY because we were not able to identify valid SC that could cover all the disabilities.     And cognitive, language, and learning disabilities was the hardest.  Is was and always will be.   For lots of reasons. 

but the WCAG 2.0 group spent  more time on cognitive, language, and learning disabilities  than on any other disability — and probably on all the other disabilities combined.   It is just a really hard group (or actually groups) to address via SC’s (which must be testable, applicable to all covered pages etc) —  as the COGA has found.   
it is easy to list things that can help 
it is really hard  to find things that are objective, (testable), and can be applied everywhere,  etc  (the requirements for any requirement ) 
it is hard to address the needs of all cognitive, language, and learning disabilities even with non-objective approaches

The intro language in WCAG 2.0 is still accurate for 2.1.   

We made progress but are hitting the same walls as 2.0 did.   
And there are more cognitive, language, and learning disabilities provisions in 2.0  (in levels A and AA as well as  AAA)  than have been added in 2.1.     

So 2.1 is not “the version where cognitive, language, and learning disabilities  was added”.    It is where 2.0 was improved - along several dimensions — but where people also discovered how hard some things are to to do. 

I don’t think the new suggested language is more accurate or more helpful.   The old language said “We did as much as we can via this mechanism and you should look a other docs as well for advice on how to make things better”.      2.1 got further than 2.0 but is in the same place overall.   It is nowhere near complete for any disability and people should continue to look elsewhere for additional guidance to do better. 

I wish it weren’t so
I wish it weren’t so hard

but this is where (I think) we are...


still searching for more ways to make things more accessible to all …  

my best 

Gregg



> On Jan 26, 2018, at 9:58 AM, Janina Sajka <janina@rednote.net> wrote:
> 
> Hi, Andrew:
> 
> I thought I should respond to you on this issue raised by COGA,
> especially as I participated actively in the COGA call where this was
> discussed and supported the approach COGA proposed.
> 
> 
> The approach arose out of the concern that the wider community of
> cognitive and learning disabilities individuals and organizations had
> somehow acquired inflated expectations of WCAG 2 support for COGA issues. The fear was that the abstract could be read as claiming parity among the various disabilities named, and COGA felt that was not only inaccurate, but actually damaging both the the reputation of WCAG and to prospects for engaging increased participation moving forward.
> 
> I understand your concern to avoid regressive implications. That's a
> reasonable consideration, imo.
> 
> So, if we're all in agreement that tweaking this language constitutes
> editorial change that can be accomplished during CR, your approach seems
> the more prudent course to me. I would agree these kinds of edits should
> not be entered in haste, so I would certainly support your commitment to
> discuss what would constitute better messaging for 2.1 during CR.
> 
> I hope my approach helps both AGWG and COGA.
> 
> Janina
> 
> 
> Andrew Kirkpatrick writes:
>> Lisa,
>> 
>> Thanks for raising this on the list. I have a few thoughts on this that I think are worth considering.
>> 
>> This language has been part of WCAG since WCAG 2.0, this is not new language in the abstract.
>> 
>> I do not believe that WCAG 2.0 fully addresses accessibility concerns for any group of users with disabilities, including people that with cognitive disabilities, and the same is true for WCAG 2.1.
>> 
>> I am concerned that we aren’t possibly setting up the expectation that WCAG 2.1 is somehow taking steps backwards in accessibility. If the language changes to say “begins to address learning disabilities and cognitive limitations at conformance level AAA” it may lead people to that conclusion, and indicate that there is nothing in the AA success criteria that benefits this group of users. Does the COGA TF believe that there is nothing at all in WCAG 2.0 that provides benefits?
>> 
>> The text that is proposed to be changed is editorial. We could change it now, but to be clear, we can also change it during the CR period.
>> 
>> What I would like to propose is that the Working Group have a discussion about how this text could be changed when we have more than two hours to make that change. Since this was just discussed on the COGA call this morning (https://www.w3.org/2018/01/25-coga-minutes.html) it is definitely a late-arriving change request, and one that can be addressed during CR. Can we commit to having the Working Group have a collective discussion about this language and arrive at consensus language early in the CR period?
>> 
>> Thanks,
>> AWK
>> 
>> Andrew Kirkpatrick
>> Group Product Manager, Accessibility
>> Adobe
>> 
>> akirkpat@adobe.com
>> http://twitter.com/awkawk
>> 
>> From: "lisa.seeman@zoho.com" <lisa.seeman@zoho.com>
>> Date: Thursday, January 25, 2018 at 10:44
>> To: WCAG <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
>> Subject: making the draft for CR accurate
>> Resent-From: WCAG <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
>> Resent-Date: Thursday, January 25, 2018 at 10:43
>> 
>> I think the draft for CR has to change the introduction:
>> 
>> from
>> 
>> Following these guidelines will make content accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities, including blindness and low vision, deafness and hearing loss, learning disabilities, cognitive limitations, limited movement, speech disabilities, photosensitivity, and combinations of these. These guidelines address accessibility of web content on desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices. Following these guidelines will also often make your Web content more usable to users in general.
>> 
>> to
>> 
>> Following these guidelines will make content accessible to a wider range of people with disabilities, including blindness and low vision, deafness and hearing loss, limited movement, speech disabilities, photosensitivity, and combinations of these. These guidelines address accessibility of web content on desktops, laptops, tablets, and mobile devices and begins  to  address  learning disabilities and cognitive limitations at conformance level AAA,
>> 
>> 
>> I am not sure if consider low vision to be addressed or "begins to addressed"
>> 
>> All the best
>> 
>> Lisa Seeman
>> 
>> LinkedIn<https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fil.linkedin.com%2Fin%2Flisaseeman%2F&data=02%7C01%7Cakirkpat%40adobe.com%7C5e0aa0123fd84199723e08d5640a76a7%7Cfa7b1b5a7b34438794aed2c178decee1%7C0%7C0%7C636524918465112191&sdata=dNUnFC87oYq%2BSeakcaAAxu0QxfEjE%2BCdodGYVTmaZLo%3D&reserved=0>, Twitter<https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Ftwitter.com%2FSeemanLisa&data=02%7C01%7Cakirkpat%40adobe.com%7C5e0aa0123fd84199723e08d5640a76a7%7Cfa7b1b5a7b34438794aed2c178decee1%7C0%7C0%7C636524918465112191&sdata=YbFr1AxwaSfG%2BqrXmKpZkXWjItdVB0zcSorhLmDXom4%3D&reserved=0>
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
> 
> -- 
> 
> Janina Sajka
> 
> Linux Foundation Fellow
> Executive Chair, Accessibility Workgroup: http://a11y.org
> 
> The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)
> Chair, Accessible Platform Architectures http://www.w3.org/wai/apa
> 
> 

Received on Saturday, 27 January 2018 17:03:40 UTC