Questions on Quick Tips revisions

To: Web Content Guidelines Working Group & Education/Outreach Working Group

We've been sending out the Quick Tips at a rapid pace (about 21,000 so
far), and need to re-order. We're taking the opportunity to clean up one or
two grammatical and formating items. In addition, we've noted a few things
which may need to be changed to ensure that the Quick Tips are better
synchronized with the final WCAG Recommendation. Your comments are welcome,
by next Thursday July 15 please -- and please reply to the
w3c-wai-eo@w3.org list. If you want to see the archives of the discussion,
they are linked from the EO home page at http://www.w3.org/WAI/EO. 

First, here is the current text of the Quick Tips card. It is also
available on-line at http://www.w3.org/WAI/References/QuickTips

FOR COMPLETE GUIDELINES & CHECKLIST: WWW.W3.ORG/WAI 
- Images & animations. Use the alt attribute to describe the function of
all visuals. 
- Image maps. Use client-side MAP and text for hotspots. 
- Multimedia. Provide captioning and transcripts of audio, descriptions of
video, and accessible versions in case inaccessible formats are used. 
- Hypertext links. Use text that makes sense when read out of context. For
instance, do not use "click here." 
- Page organization. Use headings, lists, and consistent structure. Use CSS
for layout and style where possible. 
- Graphs & charts. Summarize or use the longdesc attribute. 
- Scripts, applets, & plug-ins. Provide alternative content in case active
features are inaccessible or unsupported. 
- Frames. Label with the title or name attribute. 
- Tables. Make line by line reading sensible. Summarize. Avoid using tables
for column layout. 
- Check your work. Validate the HTML. Use evaluation tools and text-only
browsers to verify accessibility. 

Second, here are the proposed changes from the EOWG, and some also from
subsequent discussion w/ Gregg Vanderheiden, Co-Chair of the Web Content
Guidelines Working Group.

1. Change "all visuals" to "each visual."
2. Make "alt" in first item boldface.
3. Make "MAP" in second item lower case, but keep it boldface.
4. Make "css" uppercase on first item on back of card.
5. Update version number on back of card to "1999/07."
6. At "Image maps. Use client-side MAP and text for hotspots." Check that
this is consistent with final WCAG.
7. At "Multimedia," drop "and accessible versions in case inaccessible
formats are used" if people feel that the earlier part of the sentence,
"Provide captioning and transcripts of audio, and descriptions of video" is
adequate to convey the meaning here. The assumption would be that if people
are using a format that does not permit synchronized captioning or
description, this would still serve as a prompt that that information needs
to somehow be available. At one point we'd been keeping this phrase in as
an encouragement to use accessible formats in general, e.g. as a caution
about accessibility concerns for some formats such as PDF, but no one seems
to understand it this way. (We need feedback on this!)
8. At "Tables," drop "Avoid using tables for column layout" since it is no
longer consistent with what we say in the guidelines at checkpoints 5.5 and
10.3. The main point is to ensure that they serialize sensibly, which is
already covered in "Make line by line reading sensible."
9. Add hyphens to phrase as follows: "Make line-by-line reading sensible."
10. Change "Check your work" to "Check your work against complete
guidelines" as an additional prompt to send them to the real thing. What
about adding the stable URI here: http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT? The
last item on the card would then read: "Check your work against complete
guidelines.  http://www.w3.org/TR/WAI-WEBCONTENT. Validate the HTML. Use
evaluation tools and text-only browsers to verify accessibility." (By the
way, we can only add this if we drop part of the "tables" and "multimedia"
items.)
11. Other??? Are there any other critical priority one items from WCAG 1.0
that are not in some way already covered by these existing points, and that
we could cleanly & concisely fit onto this little card? For those of you
who didn't participate in the exercise earlier, the point is to get the
wording on the card as concise as possible, not as a substitute for the
guidelines, but rather as a prompt to remember key concepts with.

Thanks in advance for your comments!

- Judy
----------
Judy Brewer    jbrewer@w3.org    +1.617.258.9741    http://www.w3.org/WAI
Director, Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) International Program Office
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
MIT/LCS Room NE43-355, 545 Technology Square, Cambridge, MA,  02139,  USA

Received on Friday, 9 July 1999 10:59:38 UTC