FWD: Common interface for automatic evaluation tools

hi,

wanted to bring up an interesting idea proposed by alan to the group:


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Alan Chuter [mailto:achuter@teleservicios.com] 
> Subject: Common interface for automatic evaluation tools
> 
> I've been in contact with two Java-based evaluation tools 
> last week. Although EARL allows the integration of reports 
> from different tools, a very simple idea occurred to me to 
> allow pluggable tests. My suggestion is to establish a set of 
> common interfaces for tests and for pages. Each tool should 
> define a method that accepts a AccessibilityTest object. The 
> test object fulfils the, for example, AccessibilityTest 
> interface which defines one method:
> 
> TestResult runTest(WebDocument doc);
> 
> Each tool would provide a method to register 
> AccessibilityTest objects, and then run all the registered 
> tests against each WebDocument it creates. The 
> AccessibilityTest objects all return TestResults.
> 
> While EARL allows a comparison of results for different 
> checkpoints across different tools, this technique would 
> allow the same test code to be run on each tool. It allows 
> users to create their own pluggable tests, and potentially 
> allows a test developer to produce a test suite independantly 
> of the tool vendor.
> 
> I hope I'm not repeating something that's been discussed already.
> 
> regards
> 
> Alan Chuter.
> Accessibility Consultant.
> Fundosa Teleservicios, SA
> Fundación ONCE.
> Tel:+34 91 121 03 35
> achuter@teleservicios.com

Received on Monday, 8 September 2003 12:08:42 UTC