accessibility-support[ed|ing] technologies

Wayne, Lisa, Liam, and others,

Here is how I think the WCAG WG is thinking of it: "Accessibility supporting" would talk about what the technology does. That is, it supports accessibility. "Accessibility supported" refers to what has been done to (or is true of) a technology. That is, that there is accessibility support FOR the technology. We mean the latter not the former. So "accessibility supported" would be the correct term and would be hyphenated whenever used as an adjective.

To be honest, I'm less clear than I was before on this. If the onus is on the AT and browsers, then accessibility-supportED is correct, yes???

Remember that "technology" here is HTML, CSS, and such. Note:
* The intro of WCAG 2.0 says: "An accessibility supported technology is a technology (HTML, CSS, etc.) that will work with assistive technologies (AT) and the accessibility features of browsers and other user agents. Only technologies (including features of the technologies), that are "accessibility supported" can be used to conform to WCAG 2.0 Success Criteria. Only "accessibility supported" technologies can be used to conform to WCAG 2.0 Success Criteria Technologies that are not accessibility supported (do not work with AT etc.) can be used, but cannot be used to conform to any Success Criterion."
* Here's the definition in WCAG: http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/#accessibility-supporteddef
* And the details in Understanding Accessibility Support http://www.w3.org/TR/2007/WD-UNDERSTANDING-WCAG20-20071211/conformance.html#uc-accessibility-support-head

Some ways to think about it:
* HTML provides what is needed for accessibility (such as alt text, text resizing, heading navigation); Users' AT can handle HTML; the accessibility features of browsers work with HTML; therefore, HTML is an accessibility-support[ed|ing] technology.
* ACME-technology doesn't have accessibility support (such as alt text, text resizing, heading navigation); Users' AT can not read content in ACME-technology; the accessibility features of browsers don't do anything to content in ACME-technology; therefore, ACME-technology is not an accessibility-support[ed|ing] technology.

MINUTES FROM PREVIOUS DISCUSSION:
http://www.w3.org/2008/01/04-eo-minutes#item05

PREVIOUS EXCHANGES:

Comment 4: use accessibility-supported technologies
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-eo/2007OctDec/0174.html

EOWG comment:
We are concerned that the following sentence is still difficult to parse: "Any information or functionality that is implemented in technologies that are not accessibility supported must also be available via technologies that are accessibility supported." Particularly, the phrasing of "accessibility supported technology" throughout is a difficult construct.
We suggest that using the phrase "technologies with accessibility support" may facilitate comprehension here, and possible everywhere that the current phrase "accessibility supported technologies" is used. Such replacement here would yield:
"Any information or functionality that is implemented in technologies without accessibility support must also be available via technologies with accessibility support."

WCAG reply:
Accessibility-supported is a descriptor that we use in many places and is defined in the glossary. It is a bit awkward to get used to at first but it is a critical concept and term for WCAG 2.0. Your rephrasing makes for an easier to read sentence but the concept is lost as a defined descriptor.

EOWG reply, Jan 2008: OK, we agree with having it as a defined descriptor. However, do need to correct the grammar. Change "supported" to "supporting" and hyphenate so it's: accessibility-supporting technologies.

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Received on Friday, 25 January 2008 16:44:46 UTC