3.3, what now, what next?

Let me try to address this issue at two levels.

The first level is what to say in the next draft release.

The second is how to understand and organize our subsequent work, at least in
terms of what do do next, in this area.

*A.  For the short term, there should be two sub-items under Guideline 3,
which
under the current numbering are 3.3 and 3.4.

3.3 says in effect (not necessarily these words) "Use language in such a
way as
to maximize understandability to the widest audience."

3.4 says in effect "Illustrate your points by extra-verbal means such as
sounds
and pictures."

Between them they are the both-and which address both partial reading function
and no reading function.

THEN however we are indicating 'notes to the reviewer' there is a statement to
the effect that "We realize that 3.3 and 3.4 do not fit our general
requriements for checkpoints, in that there is no clue here as to how much is
enough.  The group failed to come to consensus on 'an objective statement of
how much is enough' in this area.  The identified techniques are expected to
improve performance in this area, however."

That is how I would deal in the short term with the problem of "is it a
checkpoint" interacting with "how do we say it."

*B.  For the long term, We seem to be agreed that this area needs work and we
should come up with some sort of a management model for how to organize the
work in this area.  

I would suggest that a) maintaining the current working base of techniques
as a
hints engine in queryable form**, not answering "tell me what to do" but
rather
"just give me a clue," and b) dedicating a sub-team to working on techniques
for Guideline 3 would be appropriate management decisions.  Somehow we need to
use technology to let us work more at a technique prototyping and evaluation
level and less at a debating society level.  This can be done, but deciding
how
is not an instant matter.

** discussing what this would mean is a separate issue.

At 09:41 AM 2001-08-21 , Gregg Vanderheiden wrote:
>CMunat - stated
>
>The problem with checkpoint 3.3 is that it says nothing. We have simply
>Restated the goal, we are not providing any new information.
>What we need are METHODS for making content clear, simple, and
>understandable.
>
>
>
>GV::
>We need to be careful here,
>
>The techniques doc is to provide ways of accomplishing something.
>
>I believe the guidelines should say what is to be accomplished,  -  but
>they should not specify HOW to do it, unless accessibility can only be
>served by doing things a particular way.   There ARE reasons for
>requiring things be done in a particular way sometimes... but we should
>not go there unless there is a good reason for it.
>

Received on Wednesday, 22 August 2001 10:21:40 UTC