Re: WCAG 2.0 Public Working Draft: Response to WG Response

Thank you

We have added the rationale to the Understanding document.

"The working group feels that 200% is a reasonable accommodation that
can support a wide range of designs and layouts, and complements older
screen magnifiers that provide a minimum magnification of 200% and
that the majority of images of text used on the web these day can be
zoomed up to 200% without pixelation being a significant barrier."

NOTE: Based on comments from Japan, we have removed the requirement
that text be sizable down to 50% because shrinking Japanese characters
by half causes legibility problems.  It is recommended however.

Regards,

Loretta Guarino Reid, WCAG WG Co-Chair
Gregg Vanderheiden, WCAG WG Co-Chair
Michael Cooper, WCAG WG Staff Contact

On behalf of the WCAG Working Group

> > ----------------------------------------------------------
> > Comment 6: Text resizing - What Level
> > Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0281.html
> > (Issue ID: 2111)
> > ----------------------------
> > Original Comment:
> > ----------------------------
> >
> > The ability to resize text can be critical to accessibility for people
> > with print disabilities such as degenerative eye sight and
> > reading/learning difficulty but this does not seem to be adequately
> > covered in the Guidelines.
> >
> > 1. SC 1.4.4 Resize Text is a Level AA requirement (rather than Level A)
> >
> > 2. Text as an image appears to be acceptable, yet images are not
> > resizable by many browsers and where image "zoom" is a feature of
> > the browser this can create other accessibility problems such as
> > broken page formats, horizontal scroll bars and pixelation of the
> > text/image. Turning images off to view the alt text is not a practical
> > solution, since many people do not know how to do this and once set
> > this preference applies to all images not just text images. It becomes
> > increasingly difficult when text based images are used for navigation
> > elements, such as an image map.
> >
> > 3. Resizing of text based form content and form controls also does not
> > seem to be mentioned and textual content in non-text based form
> > controls also needs to be resizable by the user. For example: using
> > the browser resizing options in forms is problematic when the text
> > resizes but not the radio button.
> >
> > Proposed Change:
> > 1. Move SC 1.4.4 to Level A
> >
> > 2. Text as an image should not be acceptable unless Success Criterion
> > are applied that would address the needs of people with print
> > disability
> >
> > 3. Include Success Criterion for resizing of text based and non-text
> > based form controls
> >
> > ---------------------------------------------
> > Response from Working Group:
> > ---------------------------------------------
> >
> > RE # 1. Move SC 1.4.4 to Level A
> >
> > This provision may not be implementable with some technologies
> > directly but the same effect could be achieved with assistive
> > technologies.   Because of these factors the Working Group feels that
> > his provision is better put at Level AA.  The working group examined
> > the issue of images of text carefully and felt that they should be
> > allowed,.
> >
> > The group feels that the majority of images of text used on the web
> > these day can be zoomed up to 200% and down to 50% without pixelation
> > being a significant barrier. For zooming above that AT have smoothing
> > algorithms. The group also feels that there are sufficient resources
> > in the operating system and with external AT devices that contrast
> > issues can be handled at level AA. However, we have made a note in the
> > understanding document describing some of the problems with images of
> > text such as contrast and pixelation, and we encourage text. And we
> > have added a note to 1.4.3.
> >
> > For 1.4.3: Note: Images of text do not scale as well as text because
> > they tend to pixelate. It is also harder to change foreground and
> > background contrast and color combinations for images of text, which
> > is necessary for some users. Therefore, we suggest using text wherever
> > possible, and when not, consider supplying an image of higher
> > resolution.
> >
> > For 1.4.4: Note: Images of text do not scale as well as text because
> > they tend to pixelate, and therefore we suggest using text wherever
> > possible. It is also harder to change foreground and background
> > contrast and color combinations for images of text, which are
> > necessary for some users.
> >
> > RE #3 Include Success Criterion for resizing of text based and
> > non-text based form controls
> >
> > We think this should be a User Agent guideline, and just an
> > advisory/repair  technique in WCAG. If text is big enough to be
> > useful, it will be so big that designers won't want to use it. If some
> > elements scale and others don't, the layout is likely to get messed
> > up.  Whether that's a barrier or not depends on whether content or
> > functionality is lost, but it's much eaiser to get this right when
> > everything scales such as a user agent zoom, commercial AT, or
> > operating system magnification. However we have added a sufficient
> > technique for 1.4.4: "Specifying the size of objects in terms of the
> > font size"
> >
> > By the time WCAG reaches recommendation, we expect Zoom features in
> > browsers will become more and more used among people who need moderate
> > amounts of zoom. We realize that this is not perfect, but we think it
> > is the best compromise given the alternatives.
> >
>
>
> --------------------------------
> Response to response
> --------------------------------
>
> Thanks for the time the WG put into reviewing this. I still feel that
> this should be a Level A requirement, not least because of the aging
> population. However, if it is to remain at Level AA then it would be
> helpful to include the WG rational above as part of the requirement for
> accessibility, since this provides a measurable benchmark for legibility
> of images used ie that they can be zoomed up to 200% and down to 50%
> without pixelation affecting readability.

Received on Tuesday, 11 December 2007 23:49:13 UTC