Your comments on WCAG 2.0 Public Working Draft of May, 2007

Dear Nikolaos Floratos,

Thank you for your comments on the 17 May 2007 Public Working Draft of
the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 (WCAG 2.0
http://www.w3.org/TR/2007/WD-WCAG20-20070517/). The WCAG Working Group
has reviewed all comments received on the May draft, and will be
publishing an updated Public Working Draft shortly. Before we do that,
we would like to know whether we have understood your comments
correctly, and also whether you are satisfied with our resolutions.

Please review our resolutions for the following comments, and reply to
us by 19 November 2007 at public-comments-wcag20@w3.org to say whether
you are satisfied. Note that this list is publicly archived. Note also
that we are not asking for new issues, nor for an updated review of
the entire document at this time.

Please see below for the text of comments that you submitted and our
resolutions to your comments. Each comment includes a link to the
archived copy of your original comment on
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/, and may
also include links to the relevant changes in the WCAG 2.0 Editor's
Draft of May-October 2007 at
http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/WCAG20/WD-WCAG20-20071102/

Thank you for your time reviewing and sending comments. Though we
cannot always do exactly what each commenter requests, all of the
comments are valuable to the development of WCAG 2.0.

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

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Comment 1: Support for Cognitive Impairments
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0286.html
(Issue ID: 2115)
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Original Comment:
----------------------------

They state clearly that WCAG 2.0 do not address cognitive impairments.
However, since this target group is equally important, we suggest W3C
to examine in the future to address also this group in a different set
of guidelines (say WCAG 2.0 tier). This should be a commitment stated
at the beginning of the current WCAG 2.0 document. In this way, on one
hand, there will be avoided any delay on the release of WCAG 2.0 but
also community concerned with the accessibility of cognitive
impairments will not object further on the WCAG 2.0 and additional
delays will be avoided.


Proposed Change:
This should be a commitment stated at the beginning of the current
WCAG 2.0 document.

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

We agree that work beyond WCAG 2.0 is needed to address the needs of
those with cognitive, learning, and language disabilities. However,
W3C has a formal process  which involves the Advisory committee and
leadership, identification of resources and people to lead a new
activity, etc. that must be followed before a committment is made to
carry out a new activity.  A working group cannot make a future
committment for the W3C organization in its document.  So, this is not
something we can add to WCAG 2.0 itself.

We have added a new success criterion at Level AAA

"For the visual presentation of blocks of text, a mechanism is
available to achieve the following:

        * foreground and background colors can be selected by the user
        * width is no more than 80 characters
        * text is not aligned on both the left and the right [LC-1253]
[LC-569 (add)]
        * line spacing is at least space-and-a-half within paragraphs,
and paragraph spacing is larger than line spacing [LC- 569]
        * text is resized without assistive technology up to 200
percent in a way that does not require the user to scroll horizontally
to read a line of text "

We believe that satisfying this success criterion will help people
with some types of cognitive limitations.

We have added the following advisory techniques to Guideline 3.1:

* Providing sign language versions of information, ideas, and
processes that must be understood in order to use the content (future
link)

*Making any reference to a location in a Web page into a link to that
location (future link)

*Making references to a heading or title include the full text of the
title (future link)

*Providing easy-to-read versions of basic information about a set of
Web pages, including information about how to contact the webmaster
(future link)

*Providing a sign language version of basic information about a set of
Web pages, including information about how to contact the webmaster
(future link)

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Comment 2: A, AA, AAA criteria
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0287.html
(Issue ID: 2116)
----------------------------
Original Comment:
----------------------------

he A, AA, AAA criteria should better not be mixed. They should be
grouped seperately. ( i.e. A priority group, AA priority group, AAA
priority group)

Proposed Change:
The A, AA, AAA criteria should better not be mixed. They should be
grouped seperately. ( i.e. A priority group, AA priority group, AAA
priority group)

---------------------------------------------
Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

The criteria are grouped by guideline so that related provisions are
grouped together.  Per the introduction, the goal is for authors to do
all the provisions from all levels that they are able to.

To provide this same functionality however, we have created the Quick
Reference.  This document allows you to view only what you would like.
 So you can ask for views that contain only one level at a time if a
person would like to see just the provisions for a particular level.

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Comment 3: Guideline 1.3
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0288.html
(Issue ID: 2117)
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Original Comment:
----------------------------

Obviously it is referring to the AJAX technology . In general it is
quite crucial for 'live' sites the updating of the content and it is
quite tricky and complex to allow the web site visitor (user)  to have
access to the flow of the content. Maybe this criterion should better
be addressed by the User Agent.

Proposed Change:
Maybe this criterion should better be addressed by the User Agent.

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

The user agent plays a crucial role in presenting content in alternate
ways. However, the author must create the content in such a way that
the user agent can do this. The techniques to do this are very
dependent on specific content technologies as well as the features of
user agents, so a content authoring guideline is important.

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Comment 4: SC 2.2.6 and security concerns
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0290.html
(Issue ID: 2119)
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Original Comment:
----------------------------

Criterion 2.2.6 is a must ! But again here we have to consider that
keeping data for a long period might raise security concerns.

Proposed Change:
consider that keeping data for a long period might raise security concerns

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

The working group did consider security issues while drafting this
success criterion. This is discussed in the Intent Section of
Understanding SC 2.2.6. It is because of these issues that it cannot
be applied to all web sites, and is therefore set at Level AAA.

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Comment 5: GL 1.3 needs extensive supporting material
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0291.html
(Issue ID: 2120)
----------------------------
Original Comment:
----------------------------

It is very interesting BUT it will surely need extensive supporting
material like a lot of guidance, especially on practical scenarios and
a concrete methodology.

Proposed Change:
it will surely need extensive supporting material

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

The Working Group has already provided extensive supporting material
and intends to provide more. Due to resource constraints, some of this
supporting material is expected to be developed after the work on the
core guidelines themselves has been completed. The Working Group
welcomes submissions in this area.

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Comment 6: SC 3.1.2
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0293.html
(Issue ID: 2122)
----------------------------
Original Comment:
----------------------------

Criterion 3.1.2 maybe to have more strict appliance and refer to only
those phrases which have different language from the main language of
the whole document.

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

The default language of the document is not covered in 3.1.2 because
3.1.1 applies to the default language. The default language must be
declared in 3.1.1. We believe this covers your concern.

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Comment 7: guides for error messages
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0294.html
(Issue ID: 2123)
----------------------------
Original Comment:
----------------------------

Our suggestion for this guideline is to develop here clear guides for
the accessibility Error - Corrections messages.

Proposed Change:
 develop here clear guides for the accessibility Error - Corrections messages.

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

Respond with:

The Understanding Guideline 3.3 document provides this kind of
information. We welcome input about specific content to include.
Because the "Understanding" document is not intended to become a W3C
Recommendation it can be continually changed as needed in the future.
This wouldn't affect the WCAG 2.0 doc itself though and we are
focusing on finishing that first so we can do implementations. Do send
any suggested error message examples or guidelines if you have them.
It will help us in improving the Understanding doc as we work though
implementation.

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Comment 8: under ATAG?
Source: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0295.html
(Issue ID: 2124)
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Original Comment:
----------------------------

Maybe it fits better under the Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines (ATAG)?

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Response from Working Group:
---------------------------------------------

Because of the convergence of Web Content and application behavior,
there is some convergence in requirements between authoring tool
requirements and Web content requirements. The Working Group has
determined that this requirement is extremely important for content
authoring, because ensuring proper structure is not fully supported by
authoring tools, and because Web content is still often created by
non-validating tools such as text editors. It is also covered by
reference in the Authoring Tools Accessibility Guidelines Draft
requirement to generate content that conforms to WCAG 2.0

Received on Sunday, 4 November 2007 05:03:40 UTC