Re: Suggestions on Team A homework

Hi Alex,

Thank you for the detailed response.

> I think the way to go about resolving this is to determine first if user
> trigger of opening multiple windows is allowed.

I'm not sure I follow you, here. The user can open as many windows as
they wish, as it's their user agent, and they're free to use it how
they like. The problem is when content authors make decisions on
behalf of their users.

>  I think all of us would
> agree that a user triggered of opening multiple windows actually passes
> 3.2.5 when such event is expected.

I don't agree.

> Keyword here is expected.

That's the exactly point - I never expect anyone else to make
decisions on my behalf about how I use my software.

> A concrete example is (You may skip to next paragraph if you don't need
> a business example.)

I did read this example, to try and get a better understanding of
where you're coming from. Correct me if I'm mistaken, but this sounds
to me as though you're saying, "This is how some of our systems work,
and we say they're accessible". This guideline is tied to the
principle of understandability, and predicted and expected behaviour
has to play a significant part in that. I wouldn't expect any program
I started to suddenly spawn lots of windows - it's indicative that the
system hasn't been designed correctly. What's wrong with the
traditional software engineering approach of logging everything, and
making the reports available at the user's request?

Just to put all this in context - I have no problem with the concept
of a settings page, where users can decide how they want the system to
run. By default, no automatic spawning of popup windows, but
configurable to allow such actions. At least with that kind of system,
the result is expected behaviour as it was chosen by the user.

> Re Meta refresh-The definition of change of context requires a change of
> meaning.  A page refresh does not always change the meaning of the
> content.  That is why meta refresh in and of itself does not necessarily
> meet the level of failure by change of context.

If only a portion of a page is being updated, I think that AJAX or
AHAH would be more appropriate that a meta refresh, although I'm not
sure how well AT works with these techniques. Theoretically, they
should know which parts of the DOM have changed, but they're
traditionally pretty bad at this. The problem I have with meta refresh
is that it's mainly used in an annoying way, and because of this, lots
of people set up their browsers not to allow meta refreshes. If a
particular website or web application relies on this, it means that
people will have to enable an annoying function just to be able to use
the site in question, which then leaves them exposed when they go
elsewhere. Expecting people to adjust their settings seems a bit
harsh.

Best regards,

Gez

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Received on Tuesday, 31 January 2006 23:39:25 UTC