RE: Checkpoint 3.2 (was 3.4) - Alternatives to "consistent"

I share Yvette's preference for "consistent." 

I was trying to write success criteria that made consistency testable--
for example, by specifying that content comonents that appear on
multiple resources or sections within resources occur in the same
relation to other content wherever they appear.  I *think* putting it
this way allows evaluation to take account of either spatial/visual
layout or temporal sequence (e.g., for people using screen readers and
maybe in VoiceXML?).

While I'm on the subject, I'm not sure I understand why Gregg and/or Jan
proposed moving this one to level 3, unless you'd also favor putting
something like "visual layout is consistent" at level 3 also.  A
consistent visual layout places components such as nav bars, search
forms, and standardized section headings in the main content area in the
same relation to other content on every page (i.e., headers, footers,
left-side menus, etc.).

John


"Good design is accessible design." 
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-----Original Message-----
From: w3c-wai-gl-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-gl-request@w3.org] On
Behalf Of Yvette P. Hoitink
Sent: Thursday, February 26, 2004 8:37 am
To: 'Gian Sampson-Wild (PurpleTop)'; 'WAI WCAG List'
Subject: RE: Checkpoint 3.2 (was 3.4) - Alternatives to "consistent"



Gian:
> 
> Perhaps we could have a discussion (or a vote) on which of
> the following people believe are least subjective:

Sorry to burst your bubble but to me, 'consistent' is by far the best
option. Why didn't you put that as an option? I will list my objections
to each below, using 'consistent layouts' as an example of the use of
the word.

> * Inherent

I would associate this with plain HTML without any presentational
markup. The 1993 look of the web if you know what I mean.

> * Intuitive

Intuitive for whom? the author? the visitor?

> * Reliable
> * Dependable
> * Steady

Reliable, dependable and steady web content to me has technical
associations. A website where every page has a totally different moronic
layout can still be reliable in my LGF [1]. It would apply to the
technical aspects of this checkpoint but not the presentational ones.

> * Constant
> * Uniform

Uniform and constant sound more restrictive than necessary. If I have a
website with a different color scheme for each section, that would be
consistent but in my LGF [1] it would not be uniform.

> * Regular

Sounds like 'ordinary'. We don't want to encourage extraordinary
websites.

> * Coherent

My #2, just behind "consistent". Between the two, I think more people
would understand consistent.

Yvette Hoitink
CEO Heritas, Enschede, The Netherlands
E-mail: y.p.hoitink@heritas.nl

[1] LGF = linguistic gut feeling (c) Yvette Hoitink, February 26, 2004
:-)

Received on Thursday, 26 February 2004 09:58:11 UTC