RE: Contradictory/confusing requirements wording

I think that we have decided that all user agents should provide a
keyboard interface, because so many assistive technologies allow
generation of character codes, even if they don't do anything else.  The
primary output of single switch scanning or Morse code, for example,
will be characters.  These methods may provide a means of mouse
emulation, but the keyboard will be faster and easier in all cases with
these input methods.  So, if you don't provide  a keyboard interface,
you not only lock out the keyboard, (which you may not support), but
many types of alternative access as well.

So, in this case, I think you must provide a complete control via ASCII
characters, even if your device doesn't have a keyboard on it.

Denis Anson, MS, OTR/L
Assistant Professor
College Misericordia
301 Lake St.
Dallas, PA 18612
 

-----Original Message-----
From: w3c-wai-ua-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-ua-request@w3.org] On
Behalf Of Charles McCathieNevile
Sent: Sunday, March 11, 2001 12:22 PM
To: Ian Jacobs
Cc: Hansen, Eric; 'aaronl@netscape.com'; w3c-wai-ua@w3.org
Subject: Re: Contradictory/confusing requirements wording

Maybe we could make the conformance stuff cleaner and tighter.

If the user agent doesn't have to conform to all devices, does it still
have
to provide keyboard support. (In other words, is it OK to build a user
agent
that conforms for pointing devices but not keyboard?)

If so, then the answer is "Yes, you have to do all this". If not then I
think
we have a problem.

But in any case, I don't have a problem with talking about conformance
in one
checkpoint only, especially this one...

Charles

On Sun, 11 Mar 2001, Ian Jacobs wrote:

  Charles McCathieNevile wrote:
  >
  > I liked having the conformance section at the beginning of the
document. IT
  > gives a simple way of explaining what needs to be read when you are
going
  > through it, and makes it clear that conformance is something with
meaning,
  > not just an afterthought. (All the ordering stuff should just be
editiroial,
  > but in practice it isn't necessarily. So there's my preferences).

  We got complaints that people had to wade through the conformance
  section before they got to the requirements. So it was moved
  to the back.

  I like Eric's proposal to have a brief statement about conformance
  up front, and the full section in the back.

  > As for 1.1 how about something like
  >    1.1 Ensure that the user can operate the user agent fully
  >        through keyboard input alone. If the user agent supports
input through
  >        pointer devices or voice, ensure that the user can operate
  >        the user agent fully through each of these methods alone.

  I don't think this works.

  That's what the document used to say. Then we got issue 390 [1],
  where the reviewer said "This punishes me because it says that if
  I implement the mouse at all, the user must be able to do everything
  through the mouse alone." At the AOL face-to-face meeting [2], we
  decided that the UA didn't have to do everything through pointing
  device or voice input unless conformance was sought for those
  input devices.

  So instead of saying "if the UA supports input through voice and
  pointing device", you would have to say "if the UA seeks to
  conform for voice and pointing device", but no other requirement
  in the document talks about conformance to itself.

   - Ian

  [1] http://server.rehab.uiuc.edu/ua-issues/issues-linear-lc2.html#390
  [2] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/2000/11/minutes-20001116#issue-345



  > Chaals
  >
  > On Sat, 10 Mar 2001, Hansen, Eric wrote:
  >
  >   Maybe there is a way to have a summary of the that key conformance
bit early
  >   (and perhaps even repeated) in order to address the issue that
Aaron has
  >   pointed out. Maybe even go through an example, something like
pieces of the
  >   conversation that Ian and Aaron have had. I am not excited about
bring the
  >   whole conformance section up to the beginning of the document but
perhaps
  >   some explanation could be put early.



-- 
Charles McCathieNevile    http://www.w3.org/People/Charles  phone: +61
409 134 136
W3C Web Accessibility Initiative     http://www.w3.org/WAI    fax: +1
617 258 5999
Location: I-cubed, 110 Victoria Street, Carlton VIC 3053, Australia
(or W3C INRIA, Route des Lucioles, BP 93, 06902 Sophia Antipolis Cedex,
France)

Received on Monday, 12 March 2001 11:42:25 UTC