Re: clarification sought on publishing alt text document as a WG note

Hi, Steve:

Steven Faulkner writes:
> For future reference and in attempting to better understand how the process
> works, can I please get an explanation of how a document[3] that it was
> agreed by consensus at the start of June 2014 by the HTML WG [1] and the
> HTML accessibility taskforce [2] was not published.

I can understand your frustration. Completing this document as a W3C
note seemed a pro forma task back in June to, I think, all of us. The
approvals you note were indeed obtained. However, issues arose during
the PF CfC, and things have devolved from there.

> The work to be done to
> publish this document as a note was/is mechanical and trivial, yet in Oct
> 2014 it has still not been published, and it has now appears to have been
> decided that the document's publication will not occur until unknown,
> possibly substantive changes have been made.
> 
Yes, the early issues raised could be called "mechanical," as you say.
However, I would not agree that lack of a correctly formatted masthead
with copyright, abstract, and status section is trivial. These really
should all be in place when a CfC is conducted, as objections against
the language here are also grounds for bugs. We could say that we were
somewhat sloppy about the document proposed for consideration in the
CfCs, though I think most of us were willing to overlook that.

In the past few weeks additional concerns have arisen and I would say it
is indeed likely that substantive changes will be sought. There are
already bugs filed against the current draft, and additional bugs are
expected.



> What exactly does the HTML WG CFC process mean if decisions made via such
> process are delayed for months then set aside without recourse to the group?
> 

The process did not fail. You've simply forgotten the PF componant in
the process. Without it, the HTML-WG cannot proceed.

I regret the delay, but this is an important topic in web accessibility.
Three-four years from now, I believe it will prove more important that
we paused to get things right. By then all this delay will have been
forgotten.

PS: This is pretty much a standing agendum on the TF call. As always, you are
welcome to discuss this with the TF there.

Janina

> 
> [1] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-admin/2014Jun/0055.html
> [2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-admin/2014Jun/0019.html
> [3] http://rawgit.com/w3c/alt-techniques/master/index.html
> [4] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-a11y/2014Oct/0005.html
> --
> 
> Regards
> 
> SteveF
> HTML 5.1 <http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/>

-- 

Janina Sajka,	Phone:	+1.443.300.2200
			sip:janina@asterisk.rednote.net
		Email:	janina@rednote.net

Linux Foundation Fellow
Executive Chair, Accessibility Workgroup:	http://a11y.org

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)
Chair,	Protocols & Formats	http://www.w3.org/wai/pf
	Indie UI			http://www.w3.org/WAI/IndieUI/

Received on Wednesday, 8 October 2014 19:57:58 UTC