RE: RE: working definition of baseline

Jason wrote
Is this everything we need, or do we also have to say what has so often been
urged in connection with the concept of a baseline, that it is the minimum
set of technologies which the content requires in order to be operative?
This is where the distinction is drawn between technologies which are part
of the baseline, hence essential to the content's being
presented/functional, and technologies that are not, in the absence of which
the content "degrades gracefully"?

End of JASON CLIP


I'm not sure - but I think this is all we need - because conformance to WCAG
2.0 already requires that everything be operable as part of conformance.
That is, all the functionality would need to be preserved while conforming
to the guidelines. 

But Jason you also wrote:
<Jason clip #2>
I can envisage situations in which content might pass a success criterion if
the baseline is taken to comprise all the technologies used in it, but not
if the baseline consists only of technologies that are indispensable to the
content's being presented by a user agent.
</ Jason clip #2>

I don't understand this last clip.  If you have a baseline of tech - and the
content conforms with that assumed set of tech - then I think we are all
done.   Can you give us an example of what you mean with the above clip?
Just make it a specific example labeling the baseline technologies and what
you mean by the rest. 

Thanks - I think we may be getting close.  Does this fit other people's
questions, issues, and answers? 



(relevant portions of text are preserved below so that this top posting
makes sense). 


 


 
Gregg

 -- ------------------------------ 
Gregg C Vanderheiden Ph.D. 
Professor - Ind. Engr. & BioMed Engr.
Director - Trace R & D Center 
University of Wisconsin-Madison 


-----Original Message-----
From: w3c-wai-gl-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-gl-request@w3.org] On Behalf
Of Jason White
Sent: Sunday, May 08, 2005 7:15 PM
To: 'Web Content Guidelines'
Subject: Re: RE: working definition of baseline


On Sun, May 08, 2005 at 04:48:28PM -0500, Gregg Vanderheiden wrote:
<SNIP>

Gregg Wrote:
> 
> Soooooo - how about this.
> 
> <proposal>
> 
> Baseline User Agent Assumptions.
> 
> Any set of technologies that are assumed to be supported by the user 
> agent and enabled (turned on) when determining if the content would 
> meet the WCAG 2.0 guidelines (at any level).
> 

This is good, as it captures the aspect of baseline which I think every
participant in this discussion is likely to to agree upon.

> NOTE 1: Some examples of entities that may set baselines that an 
> author may have to follow include the author, their company, a 
> customer and government entities.
> 
> NOTE 2: In the techniques document we plan to discuss techniques for 
> conforming to WCAG 2.0 based on three different baselines (i.e. 
> assumptions of technologies supported and active in user agents).
>  
> </proposal>

All fine so far. Is this everything we need, or do we also have to say what
has so often been urged in connection with the concept of a baseline, that
it is the minimum set of technologies which the content requires in order to
be operative? This is where the distinction is drawn between technologies
which are part of the baseline, hence essential to the content's being
presented/functional, and technologies that are not, in the absence of which
the content "degrades gracefully"?

I can envisage situations in which content might pass a success criterion if
the baseline is taken to comprise all the technologies used in it, but not
if the baseline consists only of technologies that are indispensable to the
content's being presented by a user agent.

So, thinking as I write here, it appears that the minimality condition does
make a difference and that the right way to think of a baseline is as
whatever technologies a given piece of content of which conformance is
claimed minimally requires for successful presentation and operation. 
My only point about accessibility was that this concept is not intrinsically
tied to any notion of accessibility and applies to all content on the Web,
whether it conforms or not; but the purpose for which we want to employ the
concept relates to accessibility evaluation.

Received on Monday, 9 May 2005 01:32:40 UTC