- From: Charles McCathieNevile <charles@w3.org>
- Date: Tue, 21 Sep 1999 15:56:16 -0400 (EDT)
- To: Jon Gunderson <jongund@staff.uiuc.edu>
- cc: w3c-wai-au@w3.org
The Authoring Tool Accesiblity Guidelines are not intended to be used as guidelines for authoring by people who know nothing or very little about markup languages - that is the role of the Web Content Guidelines and the various instructional materials based on them. Making the document seem more like it would suit such people as a substitute for WCAG would be a grave error, since it would provide a false security, at the expense of being useful for developers trying to create accessible authoring tols, and people who are trying to understand the requirements for an accessible tool. In particular, the guidelines explicitly require knowledge of the WCAG (in order to fulfil checkpoint 1.2 - the group has decided to have no techniques for that checkpoint lest anybody mistakenly think that they were a substitute for knowing the requirements). One of the intended groups of people using the guidelines (one of the more important ones if people are going to continue to create their own content) is developers of tools which can be used by people who know nothing about markup languages. However that is not the only audience. checkpoints such as 4.2, 5.2 and 6.2 are intended to address the need for tools which may or may not presume any knowledge of markup. In a tool like HomeSite which is a source-code editor it is perfectly reasonable to guide the author with help and checking, and allow them to edit the source code however they wwant to. It is not reasonable to expect source-code editing as a way of meeting P1 WCAG requirements in a WYSIWYG tool, which is the kind of tool that may be being used by someone with no markup knowledge, and it would in fact contravene checkpoint 5.1. If no help were provided, in either case, it would contradict checkpoint 4.2. So while the techniques you suggest are extremely valuable, I think they should not be incorporated as checkpoints. (In any case, this will be discussed by the Working Group). cheers Charles McCathieNevile On Tue, 21 Sep 1999, Jon Gunderson wrote: I think this approach is short sighted if this is truely the operational model of the working group. I think that there are more and more people generating HTML that have no concept of HTML markup. Tools that can guide the user to add appropriate accessibility information without the user understanding the markup is going to be critical if Web Content is going to become more universally accessible. I remember Damiel telling a story at the first WAI meeting several years ago about a person giving an HTML authoring workshop at one of the WWW conferences that did not even know the fundamentals of HTML makrup language. I think the guidelines should at least discuss these types of techniques in the techniques document. I would hope there would be more direct references in the checkpoints and guidelines. Jon At 12:54 PM 9/21/99 -0400, Charles McCathieNevile wrote: >This approach is based on a particular model of user interaction where the >user is expected not to deal with the markup. In fact many of the most >popular authoring tools are markup editors, and directing the user away from >the markup is counter to their whole interface, and would therefore >contravene guideline 5 (integrate accessibililty into the overall look and >feel). > >Guidelines 4 and 6 should cover the necessary requirements in the type of >interface you are suggesting, and your suggested scenario would be a valuable >addition to the techniques for the relevant checkpoints. Thank you again... > >cheers > >Charles McCN > > > >On Tue, 21 Sep 1999, Jon Gunderson wrote: > > The techniques talk alot about allow the author to edit the markup. While > this important and useful it would be, I think just as important to > emphesize prompting the user for functional information and hiding the > underlying markup as much as possible. Fo exampel when inserting an image > the tool could ask author not just for the ALT text and LONGDESC url. But > ask them first the purpose of the image, is it a: > 1. Decorative logo > 2. Image of person, place or thing > 3. Chart or graph > 4. Button or link > .... > > The dialog would route the author to the appropraite accessibility > questions related to the purpose of the image. The ALT and LONGDESC for > IMG or the proper OBJECT markup would be generated based on the answers and > questions the people were asked during the dialog. > > Could this approach be highlighted in the text of checkpoint? > > Jon > > Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP > Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology > Chair, W3C WAI User Agent Working Group > Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services > University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign > 1207 S. Oak Street > Champaign, IL 61820 > > Voice: 217-244-5870 > Fax: 217-333-0248 > E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu > WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund > http://www.w3.org/wai/ua > http://www.als.uiuc.edu/InfoTechAccess > > >--Charles McCathieNevile mailto:charles@w3.org >phone: +1 617 258 0992 http://www.w3.org/People/Charles >W3C Web Accessibility Initiative http://www.w3.org/WAI >MIT/LCS - 545 Technology sq., Cambridge MA, 02139, USA Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology Chair, W3C WAI User Agent Working Group Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign 1207 S. Oak Street Champaign, IL 61820 Voice: 217-244-5870 Fax: 217-333-0248 E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund http://www.w3.org/wai/ua http://www.als.uiuc.edu/InfoTechAccess --Charles McCathieNevile mailto:charles@w3.org phone: +1 617 258 0992 http://www.w3.org/People/Charles W3C Web Accessibility Initiative http://www.w3.org/WAI MIT/LCS - 545 Technology sq., Cambridge MA, 02139, USA
Received on Tuesday, 21 September 1999 15:56:21 UTC