FW: My Action Item VERY LATE sorry

>  -----Original Message-----
> From: 	Katie Haritos-Shea [mailto:kshea@apollo.fedworld.gov]  On
> Behalf Of Katie Haritos-Shea
> Sent:	Friday, September 08, 2000 2:47 PM
> To:	ryladog@earthlink.net
> Subject:	My Action Item VERY LATE sorry
> 
> Hi All, 
> 	Jason has already made some of the points that follow, moot, with
> his revised text of Sept 8th, but I am sending the action item (at the end
> of this note) anyway.
> Wendy is certainly correct that many of the ideas expressed on this last
> telecon are a rehashing of what was in the last face-to-face, which was in
> March, I joined in April, and did not read backwards in the list as I
> should have.  I apologize for being  thoughtless.  The Requirements Draft
> 2.0 clearly says (in 1) that we will address, at least, minimum
> requirements across new languages (XML), we ensure that the deliverables
> will be easy to use,  and that we will work with EO to write to a more
> diverse audience.  And,  that we will ensure that it is backwards
> compatible.  Now, I more completely understand Wendy's overly polite
> impatience with our spouting.  We are wasting valuable time, our public
> awaits!
> 	I Like Seeman's idea to clearly state the differences for input and
> output devices, and how they relate to device independence.
> 	Wendy, in response to our request to look at The Requirements Draft
> 2.0, before it is sent off: should we add XSL in the parenthesis of the
> first bullet (Presentation) of item #1?  Other than the final wording for
> backward compatability #6, it looks good to me to let it go.
> 	To the "usability testing": I met this morning with four collegues
> from my web-training days, we get together occassionally for brunch to
> keep up with each others families and careers.  One will be starting in a
> new position in her telecom company. It is a large company with over 100
> offices internationally.  She is in the number three web position, over
> seeing a completely new web operation, (rebuilding it) fresh from the
> ground up, of their intranet, internet, extranet and e-commerce
> operations.  Most of the work is going to be entirely outsourced. When I
> asked her if her contracts will include and ensure accessibility, she had
> no idea of what I was talking about !   
> 	She agreed, along with a content specialist, and our webmaster
> training professor, to be guinea pigs.  I am sending the info off to them
> now.  So, to my first action item..................			
> 	
> 
> 
> Greetings,
> 	I took on an action item to look at Jason, Wendy & Greggs', "Draft
> Reformation of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines" of 23 August
> 2000..................from a regular Joe's (or Joeinna's, in this case)
> perspective.  The approach was, an industry or government CIO, gives their
> underling (a Webmaster, Manager, Marketing, Training, Janitorial or other
> individual) the task of " Go find out what this Accessible Web Site issue
> is, and then do what it takes to get it implemented here on our web
> sites".  One can imagine this happening all around the world, if not today
> then with-in the next year or so.
>  
> 	First, I did a search on most of the major US search engines on
> "Accessible Web Design".  I think this is where many people would start, I
> am assuming (oh, no!), that they have never heard of the W3C. (Yahoo.com,
> Google.com, Altavista.com, Dogpile.Com, Excite.com, Lycos.com, msn.com,
> WebCrawler.com, hotbot.com, Snap.com. Iwon.com, GoTo.com, Looksmart.com,
> FindWhat.com) In general, the sites were the expected ones, National
> Science Foundation, Trace, HTML Writers Guild, NCAM, WDG Web Design Group,
> WebAIM, disABILITY, useit.com, NADC UCLA, UsableWeb, NCSA Univ. of
> Illinois, WGBH, Starling, AWARE, Ohio State Univ., Univ.of Iowa, DO IT-
> Univ. of Washington State, Suite 101, Microsoft, Adobe, WebAble, USGA
> National Mapping Information (Good site!).  The W3C came up as a link on
> the homepage on most of these sites.  The majority of those links led you
> to the WAI home page, a few to W3C home page, and some to WCAG WG home
> page.  Ohio State had a link directly to the Table of Contents of WCAG
> 1.0. Bravo!  Only one search engine had a direct link to WCAG
> 1.0....................Yahoo!
> 
> 	Second, I had several people I know, from various backgrounds
> (management, new webmasters, students, seasoned html coders, instructors)
> look at this page (Draft Reformation of the Web Content Accessibility
> Guidelines), ALL of whom had never been to the W3C.  I noted their FIRST
> impressions and then their more detailed written suggestions later. (Yes,
> there are many seasoned html folks who have not heard of the W3C, until
> now.)
> 
> 	Third, I tried to view the page with my freinds perspectives in
> mind.
> 
> SO.....................what follows are our responses, painful as it may
> be (I apologize in advance for feather
> ruffling)..........................here goes.
> 
> 
> 
> (This is assuming that we are successful in getting the exact WCAG 2.0
> page to be THE page that is directly linked from all those website
> home-pages I mentioned above (seems like we have the people with the pull
> in various organizations to get that done, and I beleive we should !))
> 
> 
> A.)  What is all this stuff at the top of the page?
>   
> B.)  What do I know of, or care about, which version this is and how it
> has changed from the last?  This information is surely valuable, but it
> should be placed as a footnote, or somewhere other than the top, or have a
> very small breif explaination. 
>  I want to find out how to make my tables accessible, or give a breif to
> my management team, or write a homework assignment.  Where is that stuff?
> 
> C.)  The "Status" is relevent, but, should be much shorter.
> 
> D.)  Each page needs a terse "soundbyte" at the top, telling you what you
> will find on this page.  Also links at the TOP to the other pages with alt
> text (or not), telling exactly what you will find there.  
> 
> E.)  Need to have quick clear choices when you first hit the page, on
> where you need to go if you are:
> 					a policy maker (non-technical page,
> executive summary), 
> 					or, a webmaster (technology specific
> pages), 
> 					or, an educator or student
> (tutorials, power-point presentations, in and out of the 3WC domain)
> 					or, a veteran web or software
> developer (technology specific and all other relevant 3WC documents)
> 					or, a regulator/attorney
> (checkpoints)	
> 					or, an IT manager (executive
> summary, checkpoints)
> 		
> 
> F.)  As a freind who calls himself a "management weenie" said, " I  want a
> one, two or three page summary, giving me all the information I need to
> know, to intelligently skim resumes and interview webmasters .  I don't
> need or want the technical details, the web people need that, I need to
> know what must be done (not HOW), to breif my bosses.  Then I need a
> checklist to determine if the person I hired did it all, so I can go back
> to those same bosses, and assure them that their rear-ends are now
> covered." (Can you say, Executive Summary?)
> 
> G.)  Principles 3, 4, and 5 do not have exampled explainations  before the
> Guidelines start, as 1 and 2, do. 
> 
> H.)  What is a user agent?
> 
> I.)  Do not understand those links under principle 1. 
> 
> (* I know that the WAI page covers many of these things but it has that
> same "get me out of this nightmare" un-welcoming look W3C feel about it*)
> 
> 
> Katie Haritos-Shea
> Webmaster, CIW
> Section 508 Coordinator
> NTIS/Fedworld
> Department of Commerce
> 5285 Port Royal Road
> Springfield, Virginia, 22161
> ph 703-605-6426  fax 703-605-6734
> <mailto:kshea@fedworld.gov>
> 
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