Re: Your TPAC Homework

Hi Wilco.

Good work!

I broadly like the documents – they provide quick context which is great!

The only thing I would strongly disagree with is your section on Techniques in: https://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/task-forces/conformance-testing/wiki/ACT_Overview_-_What_is_ACT.  Although, not all Techniques can be turned into fully-automated, or guided-automatic tests the test procedure in many does provide a first step to the plain English “rules” you want to develop.  And, why would we choose to ignore this massive WCAG 2.0 peer-reviewed resource so quickly – and possibly re-invent wheels?

Whilst presenting at Accessibility Scotland last Friday, it gave me an opportunity to talk with a large number of people from different organisations.  From these conversations I should say that implementation of accessibility through applying WCAG 2.0 Techniques is of great importance to many - as the Techniques are quickly understandable, and by using them many devs don’t need to go near other WCAG 2.0 documentation which can be seen as complex.  It is obvious, that tools which check if techniques have been implemented are going to be of great value to a wider audience moving forward – as the report from such tools could simply say “Technique X is not implemented correctly” - which means the devs can just go back to that Technique.

It also means that we keep open the idea that there are many ways to satisfy WCAG 2.0, not just the one we define in our rules.  In effect, I’d like to us enable devs to select which Techniques they implement (based on their build); and help them evidence their WCAG 2.0 claim by building tools that report which Techniques they have or have not implemented correctly.  This would also help maintain the rules, as old Techniques (and associated rules) could be dropped; whilst new Techniques are adopted.

Interested to hear what others in the group think?  The above is my current view, but I’m always happy to be persuaded differently ☺

Very best regards

Alistair Garrison

From: Wilco Fiers <wilco.fiers@deque.com>
Date: Thursday, 15 September 2016 at 13:24
To: "public-wcag-act@w3.org" <public-wcag-act@w3.org>
Subject: Your TPAC Homework
Resent-From: <public-wcag-act@w3.org>
Resent-Date: Thursday, 15 September 2016 at 13:24

Good afternoon everyone!

Less then a week away from our meeting at TPAC, I have some work for you gals and guys. I've created a first version of the ACT Framework Requirement. To have our TPAC meeting go efficiently, I want you all to have a close look over the next week and send your feedback to the mailinglist. We can then use this feedback as our starting point for the discussions at TPAC.

You can find the requirements document here: https://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/task-forces/conformance-testing/wiki/ACT_Framework_Requirements


Secondly, we've had a number of questions come up in the past few weeks. Our documentation isn't as clear as it could be, and I want us to do something about it. I have moved everything we had on Auto-WCAG over to the ACT Wiki. I plan to have these updated before next Thursday. Please help me out by e-mailing me changes you feel have to be made to clarify our message. You'll find this new page here: https://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/task-forces/conformance-testing/wiki/ACT_Overview_-_What_is_ACT


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Wilco Fiers - Senior Accessibility Engineer

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