Definition of Documents -- OOPS - error fixed -- use this email to comment

Sorry, 
grabbed the wrong draft - here is the actual current definition with change.    (last one was missing the new note 3) 
G



In responding to comments made during our public review of WCAG2ICT it appears that we have a flaw in our definition of document. Our current definition is:

document (as used in WCAG2ICT)
assembly of content, such as a file, set of files, or streamed media that is not part of software and that does not include its own user agent

Note 1: A document always requires a user agent to present its content to the user.

Note 2: Letters, spreadsheets, emails, books, pictures, presentations, and movies are examples of documents.

Note 3: Software configuration and storage files such as databases and virus definitions, as well as computer instruction files such as source code, batch/script files, and firmware, are examples of files that function as part of software and thus are not examples of documents. If and where software retrieves “information and sensory experience to be communicated to the user” from such files, it is just another part of the content that occurs in software and is covered by WCAG2ICT like any other parts of the software. Where such files contain one or more embedded documents, the embedded documents remain documents under this definition.

Note 4: Anything that can present its own content without involving a user agent, such as a self playing book, is not a document but is software.

Note 5: A single document may be composed of multiple files such as the video content, closed caption text, etc. This fact is not usually apparent to the end-user consuming the document / content. This is similar to how a single web page can be composed of content from multiple URIs (e.g. the page text, images, the JavaScript, a CSS file etc.).




 however, this definition is so broad that an entire email system (such as Outlook which stores all of the email in a single .PST file) would qualify as a single document. In fact, an entire hard drive (that did not contain the OS or apps that displayed it)  could be considered a document.

I therefore suggest that the phrase
" that is meant to function as a single entity rather than a collection,"

 be added so that it reads:

assembly of content, such as a file, set of files, or streamed media that is meant to function as a single entity rather than a collection, that is not part of software, and that does not include its own user agent 


Comments welcome 

Gregg
--------------------------------------------------------
Gregg Vanderheiden Ph.D.
Director Trace R&D Center
Professor Industrial & Systems Engineering
and Biomedical Engineering University of Wisconsin-Madison
Technical Director - Cloud4all Project - http://Cloud4all.info
Co-Director, Raising the Floor - International - http://Raisingthefloor.org
and the Global Public Inclusive Infrastructure Project -  http://GPII.net