Feedback on WCAG 2.0

List of errors, comments, and suggestions ordered by draft section. 
Please let me know if I can present this in a form more-easily-digested 
than plain text. Replying to my main email (listed on my site) will get 
quicker response than this account used for the public WAI-IG list.

Thanks,
James Craig
<http://cookiecrook.com/>

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Status of this Doc section, second para. Guidelines spelled "guielines."

Introduction, Section 3. Is this where Wendy wanted to use the examples 
from the AIR training materials?

Conformance Claims, Editorial Notes, bulleted list. Is the "claim" of 
conformance really this big a deal? Is the "+" enough of an incentive 
for some? Have you had requests for this? I think the claim of A+ and 
AA+ are fine, but A+n is getting out of hand. Just my two cents.

Guideline 1.1, Level 3 Success Criteria... I thought of some good 
examples for this. Full description of a fine art piece could even 
include explanation of artist's intention or emotion; something that may 
not even be obvious to non-disabled users. Also, check out the Goats 
comic strip: <http://www.goats.com/archive/?info=on>. The markup is not 
accessible, but the would-be data table does a great job of explaining 
the individual panels. Given accessible markup, it would be a great 
example of this checkpoint.

Guideline 1.1, Example 1... Agent-specific description here: "by adding 
the word link or changing the synthesizer's voice." This should be 
changed to something like, "a method determined by the user agent."

Guideline 1.1, Example 5... This could also include a longer description 
that explained the score, or perhaps an MML file.

Guideline 1.2, Level 1 Success Criteria, item 4... Erroneous line break 
here just before "real-time" noticed in print version. Might be a fluke 
or strange print media style. Can't seem to reproduce it now.

Guideline 1.2, Example 3... Why wouldn't a synchronized "descriptive 
audio" track be required for a silent animation?

Guideline 1.3, Level 1 Success Criteria, item 1a... fourth bullet 
labeled "associations between table cells and their headers" should 
probably explicitly state "data table cells." I realize that this is 
only legitimate use for a table cell, but for legacy's sake, I think the 
extra detail will help and can't hurt.

Guideline 1.3, Examples, Editorial note... How are these HTML-specific? 
Is seems that tables and forms are pretty standard in non-HTML forms, too.

Guideline 1.3, Example 2... This one needs some rephrasing using the 
"simplest language appropriate." (grin)

Guideline 1.5, Who Benefits... Would recommend adding "or other 
background sounds" to the end of this sentence. This applies to more 
than just "music."

Guideline 2.1, Level 1 Success Criteria... Why is the middle clause in 
there? Could this sentence just be, "All of the functionality of the 
content is operable through a keyboard or keyboard interface."? Also, 
the following list of three "notes" should be an ordered list (lower 
alpha) to remain consistent with rest of document.

Guideline 2.1, Level 2 Success Criteria... Could this give examples of 
"more abstract" event handlers or a table comparing some?

Guideline 2.1, Example 2, first bullet... The parenthesized portion is 
redundant and should be removed.

Guideline 2.2, Level 1 Success Criteria, Number 1, second bullet... How 
was the "at least ten times" decided?

Guideline 2.2, Examples, bullet 1.4... Typo: "after" spelled "ater."

Guideline 2.4, Level 2 Success Criteria, Number 1... "look or sound 
different" regulates design style. This may not be the realm of WCAG. 
Given the HTML example, do different structural elements like an h4 and 
a table caption /need/ to "look" different? What about acronym and abbr? 
This should not be required in all cases. Perhaps this could be 
rephrased to "sufficiently different for perception as needed."

Guideline 2.4, Level 3 Success Criteria, Numbers 1 and 2... Can examples 
be provided for these two? I'm not sure what is being requested.

Guideline 2.4, Level 3 Success Criteria, Number 3, Editorial Note... 
Testable by a script or human? Is this a matter of opinion what 
constitutes logical?

Guideline 2.4, Level 3 Success Criteria, Number 4e... Can example be 
provided?

Guideline 2.4, Example 2... How would this scalable image of a bicycle 
be spoken through a reader?

Guideline 2.4, Example 5... "different, more formal voice" should be 
left up to the user agent or content author to decide what style is 
appropriate. Perhaps this could be rephrased "discernibly different style."

Guideline 2.4, Level 2 Success Criteria, Number 2... Why does a Level 2 
criterion require a Level 1 criterion be met. Shouldn't it also require 
Level 2?

Guideline 3.1, Level 2 Success Criteria, Numbers 2 and 3... How can 
pronunciations and idioms be programmatically determined? Do you have an 
example or is there another standard to research?

Guideline 3.1, Level 3 Success Criteria, Number 2... Does context not 
count to determine the meaning of the word?

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note... All of these bullet points should be 
complete sentences, not clauses. For example, bullet 1.1 should be 
"Organize" not "Organizing." This problem goes all the way through the 
end of the editor's note and occurs occasionally throughout the 
document. Search for "ing"...

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, In general, bullet 2..."Using a style 
manual" should probably be "Using a writing style manual," as the word 
"style" has several implied meanings in this WCAG document. Perhaps 
suggest titles such as "The Elements of Style" by Strunk and White or 
"The Chicago Manual of Style."

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Vocab, bullet 1.3... Typo: erroneous 
comma after "languages."

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Syntax, bullet 2... "bulleted or 
numbered" list here implies style. This should be "order or unordered 
lists" or perhaps just "lists."

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Nouns/pronouns, bullet 1... "Use single 
nouns or short noun phrases." What? Where? Surely this isn't appropriate 
all the time.

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Nouns/pronouns, bullet 2... Period 
missing at end of sentence. Also, "example" should be capitalized.

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Verbs... If this bullet is missing 
content, should it be removed?

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Tenses, bullet 1, second sentence... The 
opening parenthesis should be after "in the first sentence" not before it.

Guideline 3.1, Editorial Note, Logic and relationships... This whole 
section seems unnecessary.

Guideline 3.1, bullet 7... "Sounds, graphics, videos and animations" 
should have a comma after "videos" to remain consistent with rest of 
document and with published writing style guidelines.

Guideline 3.1, Example 1... As far as I know, W3C should be marked as an 
abbreviation, not an acronym. Also, pronunciation should be left to the 
user agent or author styles. Most real acronyms *should* be pronounced 
as words: such as ZIP, AIR, or NATO. Other abbreviations, such as W3C, 
HTML, Thurs., FedEx, and even etc. should sometimes be spoken as 
letters, sometimes be spoken as real words, and sometimes the 
abbreviations should be fully expanded.

Guideline 3.1, Examples, suggestion for number 8... What about various 
interpretations of the word "design": graphic, software, electrical, 
project, interior, etc. Lexical ambiguity comes up all the time.

Guideline 3.2, Editorial Note... For replacement of the word "page," how 
about "document" or "resource?"

Guideline 3.2, Level 2 Success Criteria, number 1... Does "in the same 
sequence" account for sub-level navigation that can change? For example, 
depending on a site's current section, there may be an expanded sub-nav:

  * Home
  * Products
  * About us

In the "products" section, this could change to:

  * Home
  * Products
    * Software
    * Hardware
  * About us

Currently the wording does not seem to account for this.

Guideline 3.2, Level 3 Success Criteria, number 4... Can an example be 
provided?

Guideline 4.1, Level 1 Success Criteria, number 1... This rule allows 
slop tag-soup. Even backwards-compatible sites can use older DTDs. 
Violations of specifications should not be encouraged or condoned.

Guideline 4.1, Level 3 Success Criteria... This ought to be Level 2 
Success Criteria.

Guideline 4.1, Example 2... "elements designed for applying stylistic 
and presentational characteristics"? Like font and bold tags? No. This 
should should be rephrased "elements devoid of semantic meaning" like 
span. Check out arguments against this on Matt May's site and my own site:

http://www.bestkungfu.com/archive/?id=471
http://cookiecrook.com/2004/05/#cc108387135135169014

Guideline 4.2... How is the term "user interfaces" used here different 
from any other web content? A UI is part of the web content and should 
therefore be held to the same rules as any other web content, right?

Guideline 4.2, Who Benefits, bullet 1.1... This seems like, "Those who 
do this will have an easier time doing this." Is this redundant?

Guideline 4.2, Example 2... Why encourage duality? Separate but equal? 
Not likely.

Glossary, functionality... I don't agree with the wording of the first 
sentence. Functionality is not the purpose, but how the purpose is achieved.

Glossary, marked in way that the user can access prior to its 
appearance, bullet 3... What is meant by "provocative" information? What 
exactly would that information provoke?

Glossary, non-text content... images used as list bullets should count 
as style, not content, right? Also, is there an example of "any text 
that cannot be translated into Unicode?"

Glossary, technology... List not conforming to published writing style 
guides. First items should have commas, last item should have a period, 
and "or" should be after second bullet. Also, "application" should be 
capitalized.

A technology is a
  * markup or programming language,
  * Application Programming Interface (API), or
  * communication protocol.

Glossary, time-dependent presentation... Erroneous capitalization on the 
word, "or" after first bullet.

Appendix C, first bulleted list... Should contain the word "and" after 
the second-to-last bullet. Sentence leading up to that list is awkward. 
Perhaps the phrase, "when it eventually becomes a W3C Recommendation" 
should be removed.

Appendix C, first numbered list... Commas after all of these phrases, 
period on the last one, and the word "and" at the end of item 5.

Appendix C (and throughout document)... Look at the lists in Appendix C. 
There is no reason (apparent to me) why one is a bulleted list and the 
other is a numbered list. This same list inconsistency is demonstrated 
throughout the document.

Received on Tuesday, 11 May 2004 12:03:25 UTC