Merged Glossaries from WCAG, AU, and UA (2000-07-07)

I undertook the task for the WAI Evaluation and Repair [ER] group, to
merge the glossaries from the WCAG [WC], the UAGL [UA], and the ATAG [AT].
Our concern in ER is needing to use consistent definitions of terms
that we reference in the AERT. This is a coordination issue, as well as
work for the editors. After discussion yesterday, I am now sending it to
the other involved working groups. This is a work in progress.

The result is now available on my site, internal date 2000-07-07,
(93416 bytes):

Combined Glossary of Authoring Tools, User Agent, and Web Content 
Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 2000-07-07

     http://www.tiac.net/users/bingham/accessbl/allgloss.htm

The source versions for these glossary terms and their definitions are:

     WC: WCAG1.0 http://www.w3.org/TR/
     AT: TR,  http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/REC-ATAG10-20000203
     UA: 2000-07-07 working draft http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/UAAG10

The last above is already obsolete. The most recent working draft is
dated 2000-07-28. Some UA glossary terms have been changed.

I believe this work is valuable in providing a single source for such
consistent definitions of terms. If some editor from W3 chooses to make it 
available for further use by W3, it can be moved to the appropriate place
on the W3 site.

DETAILS:

I extracted each of the glossary terms, in alphabetical order, added a
suffix to each term indicating the source (AU, UA, WC). I added
"See" references for multiple phrases sharing common definition, and
added title="..." to anchors with href="#ref..." for consistency.
I made minor editorial cleanup, fixed a few typos, and added some
boilerplate in the front and rear, including W3 legal claims.

Review of the common terms should lead to convergence on inclusive
common definitions. I have not attempted such rewriting.

     AU    WC Accessible
        UA WC Assistive technology
     AU UA    Attribute
     AU UA    Auditory Description (latter has Auditory description)
     AU    WC Authoring Tool (latter has Authoring tool)
     AU UA    Captions
     AU UA WC Element
        UA WC Device independent (latter has Device-independence)
           WC Equivalent
     AU       Equivalent Alternative
        UA    Equivalent alternatives for content
        UA WC Natural Language [surprise, not in AU]
     AU       Property
        UA    Properties, values, and defaults
        UA    Text transcript
     AU       Transcript
     AU UA WC User Agent (latter two have User agent)
        UA    User agent default style
     AU       View
        UA    Views, viewports, and current viewport

To do: I have not checked that all links are live, particularly across
document sources, or for multiple targets for common href="..."
values that may have been used in the different documents.

I note the XHTML recommendation to augment places where the attribute 
name="..." to also include the same value id="..." on the anchor <a ...>.
This is done in UA, not in AU.

I also note that "text-element" is referred to with anchors two places,
though is not defined in the glossary.

LEGAL:

I assert that this derivative work is within the spirit of the W3 legal use,
even though the originals came from copyright work. I am not speaking
for or representing W3 or their legal counsel. I had taken the liberty
to include the W3 Logo, but have now removed it, as this is not supported
by W3 or WAI. I do include the W3 legal references at the bottom.

Regards/Harvey Bingham
Invited expert W3 WAI
(not an employee of W3 WAI)
http://www.tiac.net/users/bingham/
hbingham@acm.org

Received on Tuesday, 1 August 2000 13:47:50 UTC