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This document outlines a set of tests requiring human evaluation, based on the Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0 document and the mobileOK Basic Tests document, provided by the Mobile Web Initiative Best Practices Working Group
This document is an editors' copy that has no official standing.
This section describes the status of this document at the time of its publication. Other documents may supersede this document. A list of current W3C publications and the latest revision of this technical report can be found in the W3C technical reports index at http://www.w3.org/TR/.
Publication as a Group Working Draft does not imply endorsement by the W3C Membership. This is a draft document and may be updated, replaced or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to cite this document as other than work in progress.
This document has been produced by the mobileOK Pro Tests Taskforce of the Mobile Web Best Practices Working Group as part of the Mobile Web Initiative . Please send comments on this document to the Working Group's public email list public-bpwg-pro@w3.org, a publicly archived mailing list .
This document was produced under the 5 February 2004 W3C Patent Policy . W3C maintains a public list of patent disclosures made in connection with this document; that page also includes instructions for disclosing a patent. An individual who has actual knowledge of a patent which the individual believes contains Essential Claim(s) with respect to this specification must disclose the information in accordance with section 6 of the W3C Patent Policy.
Most tests have been substantially revised to improve repeatability and changes are not individually reflected.
1Introduction
1.1 Purpose
1.2 Scope
1.3 Audience
4 Tests
4.1 Access Keys
4.2 Auto Refresh
4.3 Avoid Free Text
4.4 Background Image
Readability
4.5 Balance
4.6 Device Capabilities
4.7 Central Meaning
4.8 Limited
4.9 Clarity
4.10 Color Contrast
4.11 Content Format Preferred
4.12 Control Labeling
4.13 Control Position
4.14 Cookies
4.15 Deficiencies
4.16 Error Messages
4.17 Fonts
4.18 Graphics for Spacing
4.19 Link Target ID
4.20 Minimize Keystrokes
4.21 Navbar
4.22 Navigation
4.23 Non-text Alternatives
4.24 Objects or Scripts
4.25 Page Size Usable
4.26 Page Title
4.27 Provide Defaults
4.28 Scrolling
4.29 Structure
4.30 Style Sheets Size
4.31 Style Sheet Support
4.32 Suitable
4.33 Tab Order
4.34 Tables Layout
4.35 Tables Support
4.36 Testing
4.37 URIs
4.38 Use of Color
A References (Non-Normative)
The purpose of this document, despite its subjective nature, is to provide
guidelines to content producers on how to go beyond mobileOK Basic and make
the claim of having achieved mobileOK Pro, by following the guidelines laid
out in this document.
mobileOK Best Practices is a
set of guidelines which are partially testable via the mobileOK Basic Tests Checker, a
tool for automated tests of a subset of Best Practices.
mobileOK Pro then provides a set of guidelines that fill the gaps left by the limitations of automated tests and thus completes the set of Best Practices.
This document is intended for creators, maintainers and operators of Web sites. Readers of this document are expected to be familiar with the creation of Web sites, and to have a general familiarity with the technologies involved, such as Web servers and HTTP. Readers are not expected to have a background in mobile-specific technologies.
While most tests apply to single pages or delivery units, some tests, such as ACCESS_KEYS, NAVIGATION and URIS are tested across multiple pages. To perform the tests correctly it is necessary to define the scope of the evaluation. This may be expressed using URI patterns [or groupings using POWDER]."
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
This test applies to primary navigation links that occur across all pages within a given web space which is itself defined by the presence of those navigation links. Such navigation links should be associated with access keys. Furthermore, the access key assignment MUST be identical for those links.
Access keys may be indicated to end users in any of three ways
Where there are elements, particularly navigation links and form controls, that would benefit from access keys:
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The Basic test detects the presence of an automatic refresh, the Pro test looks for a user option to prevent automatic refresh.
If the Basic Test results in a warning about auto refresh and there is no link provided to another instance of the content which does not refresh [FAIL]
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If the user is asked to fill in a form and if there is a finite number of possible values that the user could enter and those options are not presented either as a series of radio buttons, check boxes or a select menu: [FAIL].
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests, but it is worth noting that the DDC does support background images which are part of CSS 1.
The use of patterned or photographic background images behind text is discouraged but not prohibited.
If background images are used, the COLOR CONTRAST test must be passed for the ratio between the overlying text and each color used in the background image. Otherwise: [FAIL]
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None.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If the page contains more than 30 links: [FAIL]
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This test cannot cover all the possible capabilities that might be found
in devices.
Unlike the DDC, many real devices support scripting, XML HTTP requests, DOM
capabilities, cookies and CSS including media queries.
However, it is usually possible to detect a presentation that is artificially
constrained by the limited and largely hypothetical Default Delivery Context.
Rather trying to find where device capabilities are not utilized it is more conclusive to identify those instances where the content is wrongfully limited on a device more capable than the DDC.
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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Advise on the use of the type attribute on links to provide information in machine-readable format for future user agents.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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This test is subjective and cannot be conclusive. It must therefore remain at a warning level to be informative.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If the text is, for the context, considered to be unnecessarily complex or verbose [WARN]
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This test could well be machine testable as there are publically accessible applications which compare color values.
This test is actually defined in http://www.w3.org/TR/2007/WD-WCAG20-TECHS-20070517/Overview.html#G18, to which we refer here
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If the contrast ratio is less than 5:1, according to http://www.w3.org/TR/2007/WD-WCAG20-TECHS-20070517/Overview.html#G18 [FAIL]
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This test is machine testable and we are not sure why is it not covered in the basic tests. The number of alternative formats is small and could be searched for by issuing subsequent appropriate requests.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
Typical changes to preferences such as the following should be reflected accordingly:
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This test is machine testable
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
for
attribute is not defined and the form control
is not contained within the label element: [FAIL]for
attribute is present but does not correspond to
the id
attribute of a form control: [FAIL] The BP says labels ashould be positioned �properly� but gives no clue as to what this means. It should either clarify what is intended or this BP should be deprecated."
Note by Alan Chuter: (first bullet point) The BP says �Make sure that where the label goes is consistent and close to the form control so re-flowing or adapting the content intelligently will always recognize label controls and keep them together.� This means that the user agent, when �adapting the content intelligently� will recognise the controls [and label text] and keep them together. If they are just positioned so they look good visually, the UA (which can't see them) will not necessarily be able to understand. However, the convention arose in the first place to make the form visually easier to use, with the meaningful text label at the left of the screen, perhaps preceded by a radio button. This makes good sense for the mobile device with its small viewport, but is not mentioned in the BP. If the controls are not used consistently (according to convention), then there is no point in doing the BP. Either we follow the convention or we deprecate the BP.
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
See Gez Lemon's article on Label Positioning. The examples should be in the BP document.
I was not able to find any examples that should be included here. There are discussions shown on the page. Alan, please specify.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
A site that requires a user to login might store that login in a cookie to save the user typing in their credentials each time they visit. If cookies are unavailable, an acceptable degradation would mean that the user was prompted for a login each time they visited that page, but would browse the site without further logins from then on. A poor (and unacceptable) cookieless degradation would render a site useless by always checking for a non-existent cookie and so not letting the user past the login page.
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This test cannot test all existing deficiencies of devices. Rather the test limited to the author/provider being aware of common deficiencies and do something about those. This test is not intended to test pixel perfect rendering across devices, but rather focuses on usability across devices.
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If there are common deficiencies of devices, which impinge significantly on usability of the content being offered, measures must be taken to work around those deficiencies. If not [FAIL]
Some devices which render tables badly will wrap columns by default, if the meaning of the page is dependent on layout which does not render well on these sorts of devices then an alternative rendering should be used when that user-agent is detected.
Can we make use of - http://dev.w3.org/2008/mobile-test/doc.html to identify deficiencies of a device?
An external tester can not know what errors generate error messages, or what languages are available.
That is not quite true. At least a 404 is easy to produce and available languages can be inquired.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
1. Provoke a server-side error.
2. Examine the content of the error page. All the following must be true, if not [FAIL].
It must:
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The mechanism by which a context specific error message can be displayed in not clear. For example, how to display a French error message if the user was in the French section of the site.
The intent of the BP stated in 5.4.16.1 is that meaning should be conveyed without relying on font-related styling. However, the "Machine Test" under 5.4.16.2 fails on any presence of any font-related styling (whether it conveys meaniong or not).
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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This test does not rely on a particular graphics format that are being evaluated.
This BP is partially covered by the GRAPHICS_FOR_SPACING MobileOK basic Test.
Does the content comply with GRAPHICS_FOR_SPACING MobileOK Basic Test? If not [FAIL].
View all images in a page, for example in a separate list of images, or by
outlining them. For XHTML these will be included using the <img>
element.
Determine visually whether any of the images do not convey information and
are used for spacing. If they are [FAIL].
Note: Spacer images do not convey useful information. They are normally very small.
Define unambiguously what is and is not a spacer image.
Should this test exclude 1x1px advertising images? I.e those which send page hit data back to a server for user analysis? These are commonly used on e-commerce sites and wont be going away anytime soon.
I believe not, because those images are usually not anchored in the content itself but are pulled from a tracking server.
The abbreviation "ID" included in the handle of the BP, is confusing and suggests it involves the ID attribute. The test covers the use of hreflang, type and charset attributes which are not mentioned in the BP.
This test only deals with the descriptive portion of a link
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
(These liberally adapted from UWEM 1.0 13.1).
Can contextual information can provide enough explanation for a "click here" link?
What is meant here is that there are instances were enough information is provided in the preceeding or surrounding text that a more detailed link description is not needed
Accessibility evangelists would crucify us if we did not discourage the use of 'click here' link text.
This test is covered by tests for AVOID_FREE_TEXT, URIS, CENTRAL_MEANING and PROVIDE_DEFAULTS.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
Link missing that was referred by [1]. Please let me know which it is.
fit on a single line in the DDC? If not [FAIL].
Navigation bar consisting of only: Home; Up; Site map; Search...
There seems to be confusion in the MWBP document. The title refers to �consistent navigation�. However, the second paragraph discusses �Intelligent grouping� and the �How to do it� section suggests providing a drill-down list based on section headings, rather than about being consistent (it doesn't say use drill-down lists consistently). The latter is more relevant to [STRUCTURE] than to this BP. What was the intent, consistent navigation across a site or just good navigation in a page? This test assumes that consistency is what must be tested.
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
The word "sample" in the Test procedure was fitted with links which were non-sensical. Are there samples missing or was some other point being made?
More examples needed.
It is not made explicit in the BPs whether all non-text content is covered or only images included with the <img> element.
The BP is actually in conflict here. The BP itself says "Provide a text
equivalent for every non-text element.".
Yet in "What to test" it says "Test for presence of alt attribute on images
and text content on objects." and elaborates to make sure that objects are
supported.
This is actually a subset of the BP itself and therefore in conflict.
Conversely, the BP states "every non-text element", which greatly increases
the scope of this test.
Additionally, the BP does give a reference to the WCAG definition of
"non-text element", which is:
Non-text Content [WCAG20] 2001-12-10
See also Normative, Informative
Non-text content includes images, text in raster images, image map regions,
animations (e.g., animated GIFs), applets and programmatic objects, ascii
art, scripts, images used as list bullets, spacers, graphical buttons, sounds
(played with or without user interaction), stand-alone audio files, audio
tracks of video, and video.
Therefore it seems sensible to adapt the text given by Web Content
Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 and deal with all the non-text elements
This test deals with images only. Other non-text content is not mentioned explicitly in the Best Practices and is beyond the scope of this test. Such content includes horizontal rules, form controls, audio, video, multimedia elements, embedded objects and frames.
While not all non-text elements are supported by the DDC, tests should fokus on the super set of elements provided by markup languages.
The original intent of the proposed human test for this BP is linked to the meaning of alternative text. While alt="this is alternative text" fulfills the letter of the guideline in terms of usage of the alternative text it leads such practice ad absurdum. This Test will cover both the extension to other non-text elements and the meaning of alt text.
This test covers the meaning of textual alternatives as well as additional non-text elements. The mobileOK Basic test only covers the presence or absence of the alt attribute for images and objects, not its value.
Referring to http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/#gl-provide-equivalents
Non-text elements include images, graphical representations of text (including symbols), image map regions, animations (e.g., animated GIFs), applets and programmatic objects, ascii art, frames, scripts, images used as list bullets, spacers, graphical buttons, sounds (played with or without user interaction), stand-alone audio files, audio tracks of video, and video.
If content does not meet Basic Test NON_TEXT_ALTERNATIVES, [FAIL]
For XHTML content if any of the following UWEM 1.0 tests are not met, [FAIL].
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This test covers the functionality of documents without objects or scripts, in addition to the mobileOK Basic Tests.
If, without objects or scripts active or present, the document cannot be viewed or used such that the original intent of the web page is fulfilled [FAIL]
From http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT/wai-pageauth.html#tech-scripts
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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This test covers the meaning of the title, in addition to the existing mobileOK Basic Tests
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This test covers the usefulness of the preselection, in addition to existing mobileOK Basic Tests .
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If testing a webpage with a device, and horizontal scrolling appears. For each element wider than screen size:
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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It is not clear what structural markup is and which elements are included in this definition.
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There is no guidance on this parameter and a value was picked
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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Several tests refer to white space. White space has the same definition in this document as in XML. For XML 1.0 [XML10] it is defined in http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml/#sec-common-syn as being:
S ::= (#x20 | #x9 | #xD | #xA)+
i.e. the characters SP,
TAB, CR and LF.
Could this be applied to a CSS?
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If content is unreadable or unintelligible with stylesheets disabled [FAIL]
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This test is clearly very subjective, therefore the threshhold for a FAIL is very high. It must be beyond reasonable argument that the presentation of the content is inapropriate for a mobile context.
This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
Examine content to determine if, given the subject matter, it is appropriate in a mobile context. If not [FAIL]
Examine the content to determine if the presentation is very obviously inappropriate in a mobile context. If so [FAIL]
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
Does the tab order of links, form controls and objects follow a logical or thematic order? If not [FAIL]
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As of this writing, CSS is itself deficient in that it does not support a grid layout that auto adjusts vertically. It must be recognized therefore that some layouts can currently only be achieved using tables.
In addition to the mobileOK Basic Test, this test checks usage for layout.
If tables are used in a fashion that could be achieved using CSS [FAIL]
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We had originally asked why this test is not included in basic tests, but the Open Issue below spells it out. How can it be determined if a device supports tables? Just look it up in UAProf or can the Checker do something here?
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
If the device does not support tables and the table element is found within the source code [FAIL]
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Is there a way to programatically determine if a device supports tables?
This BP gives no information about what is being tested, which calls this BP into question as being useless.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
I would also offer: Has this content been validated? If not [FAIL] and Has this content been tested with the Checker? If not [FAIL]
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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This test does not exist in mobileOK Basic Tests.
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