Abbreviations at Level 2 (was Re: Moving forwards)

Hi Gez,

At 05:54 4/11/2005, Gez Lemon wrote:
<blockquote>
(...)
One of the issues discussed on the 3rd November teleconference [1] was
about moving guideline 3.1 level 3 success criterion 3 [2] to level 2.
To summarise, guideline 3.1 L 3 SC 3 states, "A mechanism for finding
the expanded form of abbreviations is available".

This success criterion is relatively simple enough to implement
</blockquote>

It is easy to implement in HTML/XHTML, and the focus on this technology
biases the discussion. Many other technologies don't have a convenient
mechanism like HTML's abbr and acronym elements, for example SVG and
VoiceXML.
In SVG, it is possible to refer to a glossary or a list of abbrevations.
In VoiceXML, the developer would need to develop an extra (sub)dialogue
and make sure that this dialogue can be accessed from any other point
in the application where abbreviations are used. This may be feasible
for abbreviations, but not for 3.1 L3 SC1 (definitions for every word).

<blockquote>
A recurring argument against any proposal for a success criterion that
is beneficial to people with cognitive problems is that the success
criterion may be detrimental to websites that are aimed at
professionals.
</blockquote>

Yesterday, I heard this argument only in the context of GL 3.1 L3 SC2
(definitions for words used in an unusual or restricted way), so I
object to your generalization.

My reservations about certain success criteria have more to do with
support in technologies (see my previous mail [1]).

[1] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-gl/2005OctDec/0191.html

Regards,

Christophe Strobbe


-- 
Christophe Strobbe
K.U.Leuven - Departement of Electrical Engineering - Research Group on 
Document Architectures
Kasteelpark Arenberg 10 - 3001 Leuven-Heverlee - BELGIUM
tel: +32 16 32 85 51
http://www.docarch.be/ 


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Received on Friday, 4 November 2005 10:27:17 UTC