Re: [Fwd: A Call to Reorganize WCAG 2.0]

As I recall, in September 2001 when I was a part of WCAG the face to face
meeting resolved essentially tis, except with a more intelligent approach to
things that were necessary for accessibility but could not be machine tested
(such as whether alt-text is actually useful...)

cheers

Chaals

On Mon, 23 Aug 2004, James Craig wrote:

>
>I assume most of you are on the WAI-IG list, but I thought I would
>forward this one for GL discussion. The archive (with replies) can be
>found here:
>
><http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ig/2004JulSep/0392.html>
>
>Cheers,
>James
>
>
>-------- Original Message --------
>Subject: A Call to Reorganize WCAG 2.0
>Date: Mon, 23 Aug 2004 07:56:08 -0400
>From: RUST Randal <RRust@COVANSYS.com>
>To: WAI <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
>
>
>I just sent the following message to the Working Group. It is, in my
>opinion, what will be necessary in order for WCAG Guidelines to gain
>wider acceptance by making them more practical to understand, implement
>and test.
>
>-------------------------------------------
>
>Based on several heated discussions that are currently going on over on
>the WAI-IG list, and at the suggestion of David Pawson, I propose the
>following:
>
>     WCAG should be divided into Guidelines, which can
>     be measured and tested, and Suggested Best Practices, which
>     can only be tested by a person.
>
>The Guidelines should deal strictly with W3C Technologies, so that
>vendors can be left to ensuring the accessibility of proprietary
>technologies such as Shockwave and PDF. Vendor technologies can then be
>addressed in the Suggested Best Practices. Other items, such as clarity
>of content, should also move out of Guidelines.
>
>I propose this because WCAG Guidelines must be measurable and
>quantifiable. There can be no gray areas, otherwise it makes it too
>difficult to make a business case for accessibility. The measurable
>Guidelines must work entirely in concert with other W3C publications,
>such as HTML, XHTML, CSS and DOM. Moving outside of the W3C realm only
>causes confustion, frustration and, ultimately, ignorance of
>Accessibility Guidelines.
>
>The average developer can easily grasp HTML validation and its results,
>but cannot easily understand the results of a BOBBY test. Accessibility
>testing always results in ambiguous results that are confusing in some
>aspects. All too often, the final decision on accessibility is left up
>to human judgement -- which may or may not be accurate.
>
>In order for WCAG to gain greater acceptance, its Guidelines must be
>quantifiable. Developers and designers must be able to validate their
>pages and get clear-cut results, just like with HTML validation.
>
>If WCAG 2.0 is open to interpretation, then the W3C will only be adding
>to the difficulty of developing accessible Web sites, not making it
>easier.
>
>Thank you.
>
>----------
>Randal Rust
>Covansys Corp.
>Columbus, OH
>
>

Charles McCathieNevile  http://www.w3.org/People/Charles  tel: +61 409 134 136
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Received on Monday, 23 August 2004 21:45:35 UTC