form orientation, navigation, and submission techniques

aloha, scott!

while i am in the midst of composing a more complex post about the 
interdependence of the three WAI guidelines documents in assuring users 
efficient means of orientation when inside a FORM and when navigating 
FORMS, i did want to point out that several of the problem statements and 
proposed solutions you posted to the list yesterday, on the topic of blind 
users' interaction with forms, have been addressed as part of the 
techniques on forms contained in the Techniques for the User Agent 
Accessibility Guidelines

in particular, refer to the Form Techniques section, which is located at:
http://www.w3.org/TR/WD-UAAG10-TECHS/#form-techniques
and which is divided into the following sub-sections

1. Form navigation techniques
2. Form orientation techniques
3. Form control orientation techniques
4. Form submission techniques

as well as in the following excerpts from techniques for specific UAAG 
checkpoints

Techniques for Checkpoint 7.5
+ For forms, allow users to find controls that must be changed
    by the user before submitting the form. Allow users to search
    on labels as well as content of some controls.

Techniques for Checkpoint 8.6
+ Provide a structured view of form controls (e.g., those
   grouped by LEGEND or OPTGROUP in HTML) along with their
   labels.

Techniques for Checkpoint 9.2
+ Allow the user to configure script-based submission (e.g.,
    triggered by an "onChange" event). For instance, allow these
    settings:
        1. Do not allow script-based submission.
        2. Allow script-based submission after confirmation from
             the user.
        3. Allow script-based submission without confirmation from
             the user.
+ Users who navigate a document serially may think that the
    submit button in a form is the "last" control they need to
    complete before submitting the form. Therefore, for forms in
    which additional controls follow a submit button, if those
    controls have not been completed, inform the user and ask for
    confirmation (or completion) before submission.

Techniques for Checkpoint 10.3
+ Provide information about which keys activate form controls.

-- end list of selected UAAG Techniques

of course, these are in-the-future solutions, but many of them are readily 
implementable...  how implementable, i suppose, will be put to the test -- 
first during the Proposed Recommendation (a.k.a. member-review) period for 
the User Agent Guidelines, which ends on 7 april 2000, and then in the 
ensuing months, when new releases of, and/or updates for, user agents begin 
to appear...

by the way, have you given any thought of making your transformation 
utilities/applications/applets available as proxy servers?  you have some 
very effective methods of exposing content to anyone experiencing the web 
in a linear fashion, which could be more widely tested by running a proxy 
server which would redeliver transformed pages to users...   that, i 
personally, believe, is a very sound interim strategy, and one that will 
benefit a lot of people not only in the short term, but for some time to 
come -- especially those who don't have access to the latest in adaptive 
technology, the latest releases of script-capable browsers, those working 
in script-incapable environments, and anyone who really hates all of the 
advertising and attention-grabbing gimmicks on the web!

for the long term, i'm still firmly in favor of client-side solutions, but, 
then again, i'm getting awfully tired of experiencing the web mostly by 
listening to and tweaking and then reloading document source...  on the 
other hand, i am quite impressed by how clearly JFW 3.5 can expose visually 
oriented/rendered content and how it has greatly enhanced the navigational 
and orientation capacities available to me, but then, i am fortunate enough 
to own a copy of JFW 3.5 and a computer (with enough processing power and 
RAM) upon which to run it and several different browsers...

gregory
--------------------------------------------------------
He that lives on Hope, dies farting
      -- Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard's Almanack, 1763
--------------------------------------------------------
Gregory J. Rosmaita <unagi69@concentric.net>
    WebMaster and Minister of Propaganda, VICUG NYC
         <http://www.hicom.net/~oedipus/vicug/index.html>
--------------------------------------------------------

Received on Friday, 17 March 2000 06:45:22 UTC