Re: First draft of "Selecting Software for Developing Accessible Web Sites"

At 01:39 AM 12/14/01 -0500, Charles McCathieNevile wrote:
>There is not much point saying this document must not be referenced or quoted
>in any form - that is required to make useful comment on it. I suggest
>something like "should not be referenced or quoted except as work in
>progress. Readers should note that this document is likely to be updated and
>changed." There are many examples of this in W3C Working Drafts.

This is in fact derived from some W3C Working Drafts, and standard in EOWG 
drafts, although due for a change, but still for something as short as 
possible.

>It would be useful if there was a dated version identifier as well as a
>latest version URI - particularly in terms of review comments. (This review
>was made on the version provided at 0630UTC 14122001)

Date is there, at bottom of document, and serves as version identifier. 
There is a lobby to move it near top. There is another lobby to keep tops 
of WAI Resource docs free of as much doc status info as possible so reader 
can fall in. May re-try status links from doc top [editor - status - 
updated - copyright] to info at bottom of doc.

WAI Resource docs are edited in place, rather than w/ latest version URI's.

>The Site Map link should probably say "WAI site map" - at first I actually
>expected either a W3C map or one for this suite.

Experimenting w/ shortened version of all the nav links. Good to know which 
ones become the most confusing.

>I like the suite links
>
>   "As of the last revision of this document, no single authoring tool meets
>   all requirements of Level A Conformance to ATAG 1.0;"
>
>should be "no tool is known to conform to..."

Right.

>   "The Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines Working Group (AUWG)
>   periodically reviews authoring tools to test their conformance with ATAG
>   1.0."
>
>The working group does not do the reviews, it just collects them. Some are
>done by members of the group, some are done by other people.

OK.

>Many of the reviews are up to date, although they are not complete reviews -
>normally covering some sections of ATAG only.

Difficult to tell which are up to date. Some of the dates are quite old & 
not clear whether there are later product versions.

Why not complete reviews?

>  * When selecting new or replacement software:
>    + Which applications are more conformant with ATAG 1.0?
>    + Which applications have a more accessible user interface?
>
>Accessibility of the User interface is part of conformance to ATAG 1.0, so
>the question is redundant.

Right.

>Another question to ask is
>
>   which tool meets the particular accessibility requirements of current
>   staff, which tools will meet possible new needs?

This might leave some procurement people puzzled, particularly the part 
about trying to predict the future. But we can experiment with different 
tweaks of this.

>cheers
>
>Charles
>
>   Please take a look and let's discuss it at our meeting today:
>            http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO/Drafts/impl/software

-- 
Judy Brewer    jbrewer@w3.org    +1.617.258.9741    http://www.w3.org/WAI
Director, Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI), World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
MIT/LCS Room NE43-355, 200 Technology Square, Cambridge, MA,  02139,  USA

Received on Friday, 14 December 2001 02:12:45 UTC