ATAG2 Conformance section update proposal

Hi all,

Below is a proposal for reworking the conformance section to use the new conformance types we have been discussing. I have also attached a Word version with headings and a few notes. Shortly I will send some survey questions.


Conformance
=========This section is normative.
Conformance Requirements
--------------------------------Success Criteria Satisfaction:

The first step in determining ATAG 2.0 conformance is to assess whether the Success Criteria have been satisfied. The potential answers are:•	Yes: In the case of some success criteria, this will include a Level (A, AA, or AAA) with reference to WCAG 2.0. If a conformance claim is made, an explanation is optional, but strongly recommended.•	No: If a conformance claim is made, an explanation is optional, but strongly recommended.•	Not Applicable:  The ATAG 2.0 definition of authoring tool is inclusive and, as such, it covers software with a wide range of capabilities and contexts of operation. In order to take into account authoring tools with limited feature sets (e.g., a photo editor, a CSS editor, a status update field in a social networking application), many of the ATAG 2.0 success criteria are conditional, applying only to authoring tools with the given features(s). If a conformance claim is made, an explanation of why the success criterion is not applicable is required.

Relationship to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0:
Because WCAG 2.0 [WCAG20] is the most recent W3C Recommendation regarding web content accessibility, ATAG 2.0 frequently refers to WCAG 2.0 in order to set requirements for (1) the accessibility of web-based authoring tool user interfaces (in Part A) and (2) how authors should be enabled, supported, and guided toward producing web content that is accessible to end users with disabilities (in Part B).Whenever success criteria or defined terms in ATAG 2.0 depend on WCAG 2.0, they are marked with "(WCAG)". 
Note on "accessibility-supported ways of using technologies":Part of conformance to WCAG 2.0 is the requirement that "only accessibility-supported ways of using technologies are relied upon to satisfy the WCAG 2.0 success criteria. Any information or functionality that is provided in a way that is not accessibility supported is also available in a way that is accessibility supported." In broad terms, WCAG 2.0 considers a web content technology to be "accessibility supported" when (1) the way that the web content technology is used is supported by users' assistive technology and (2) the web content technology has accessibility-supported user agents that are available to end users. This concept is not easily extended to authoring tools because many authoring tools can be installed and used in a variety of environments with differing availabilities for assistive technologies and user agents (e.g., private intranets versus public websites, monolingual sites versus multilingual sites). Therefore: ATAG 2.0 does not include the accessibility-supported requirement. As a result, ATAG 2.0 success criteria do not refer to WCAG 2.0 "conformance", but instead refer to "meeting WCAG 2.0 success criteria".Once an authoring tool has been installed and put into use, it would be possible to assess the WCAG 2.0 conformance of the web content that the authoring tool produces, including whether the WCAG 2.0 accessibility-supported requirement is met. However, this WCAG 2.0 conformance assessment would be completely independent of the authoring tool's conformance with ATAG 2.0.
Conformance Options and Levels:

There are two types of conformance, each with three levels:
ATAG 2.0 Conformance (Level A, AA, or AAA)This conformance option may be selected when an authoring tool can be used to produce web content without additional authoring process components. The level of conformance is determined as follows:•	Level A: The authoring tool satisfies all of the applicable Level A success criteria.•	Level AA: The authoring tool satisfies all of the applicable Level A and Level AA success criteria.•	Level AAA: The authoring tool satisfies all of the applicable success criteria.Note 1: The Part A Conformance Applicability Notes and Part B Conformance Applicability Notes must be applied. Note 2: If the minimum conformance level (Level A) has not been achieved (i.e., at least one applicable Level A success criterion has not been met), it is still beneficial to publish a statement specifying which success criteria were met.

Statement of Partial ATAG 2.0 Conformance - Process Component (Level A, AA, or AAA)This conformance option may be selected when an authoring tool would require additional authoring process components in order to conform as a complete authoring system. This option may be used for components with very limited functionality (e.g. a plug-in) up to nearly complete systems (e.g. a markup editor that only lacks accessibility checking functionality). The level of conformance (A, AA, or AAA) is determined as above, except that "No" answers are ignored on the condition that, for all "No" answers, the tool would not prevent the success criteria from being met by another authoring process component as part of a complete authoring system. Note 1: Authoring tools do not qualify for the exemption if they prevent additional authoring process components from meeting the failed success criteria (e.g. for security reasons). Note 2: The Part A Conformance Applicability Notes and Part B Conformance Applicability Notes must be applied. 
Web Content Technologies Produced: Authoring tools conform to ATAG 2.0 with respect to the production of specific web content technologies (e.g., Level A Conformance with respect to the production of XHTML 1.0).If an authoring tool is capable of producing multiple web content technologies, then the conformance may include only a subset of these technologies as long as the subset includes any technologies that the developer either sets for automatically-generated content or sets as the default for author-generated content. The subset may include "interim" formats that are not intended for publishing to end users, but this is not required.Live Publishing Authoring Tools:  ATAG 2.0 may be applied to authoring tools with workflows that involve live authoring of web content (e.g., some collaborative tools). Due to the challenges inherent in real-time publishing, conformance to Part B of ATAG 2.0 for these authoring tools may involve some combination of support before (e.g., support in preparing accessible slides), during (e.g., live captioning as WCAG 2.0 requires at Level AA) and after the live authoring session (e.g., the ability to add a transcript to the archive of a presentation that was initially published in real-time). For more information, see the Implementing ATAG 2.0 - Appendix E: Authoring Tools for Live Web Content.
Conformance Claims (Optional)
-------------------------------------Note: As with any software application, authoring tools can be collections of components. As with a legal claim, a conformance claim can only be made by a responsible entity. Any other attempted "claims" are, in fact, reviews.
Required Components of a Conformance Claim1.	Date of the claim.2.	Guidelines title, version and URI "Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 at @@"3.	Conformance level satisfied.4.	Authoring tool information: The name of the authoring tool and sufficient additional information to specify the version (e.g., vendor name, version number (or version range), required patches or updates, human language of the user interface or documentation).a.	Note: If the authoring tool is a collection of software components (e.g., a markup editor, an image editor, and a validation tool), then information must be provided separately for each component, although the conformance claim will treat them as a whole.5.	Platform(s): The platform(s) upon which the authoring tool operates: a.	For user agent platform(s) (used to evaluate web-based authoring tool user interfaces): provide the name and version information of the user agent(s).b.	For platforms that are not user agents (used to evaluate non-web-based authoring tool user interfaces): provide the name and version information of the platform(s) (e.g., desktop operating system, mobile operating system, cross-OS environment) and the name and version of the platform accessibility service(s) employed.6.	A list of the web content technologies produced by the authoring tool that are included in the claim. If there are any web content technologies produced by the authoring tool that are not included in the conformance claim, these must be listed separately.7.	Results for each of the success criteria: Yes, No, Not Applicablea.	Note: If any success criteria are judged not applicable, an explanation must be included. 
Optional Components of a Conformance Claim
In addition to the required components of a conformance claim above, consider providing additional information to assist authors. Recommended additional information includes:1.	An explanation of the success criteria results (Yes, No). (strongly recommended)2.	Information about how the web content technologies produced can be used to create accessible web content (e.g., links to technology-specific WCAG 2.0 techniques).3.	Information about any additional steps taken that go beyond the success criteria to enhance accessibility.4.	A machine-readable metadata version of the conformance claim. 5.	A description of the authoring tool that identifies the types of editing-views that it includes.
DisclaimerNeither W3C, WAI, nor AUWG take any responsibility for any aspect or result of any ATAG 2.0 conformance claim that has not been published under the authority of the W3C, WAI, or AUWG. 

(Mr) Jan Richards, M.Sc.
jrichards@ocad.ca | 416-977-6000 ext. 3957
Inclusive Design Research Centre (IDRC)
OCAD University