A testability example

Hi Folks
The COGA task force have been having an interesting discussion., I thought it would pass it on to the WCAG list to check we are on the same pagein terms of testability 


we have a  criteria such as  Simple, clear, and common words: Use words or phrases that are most-frequently used for the current context, unless it will result in a loss of meaning or clarity. 


The base criteria (not the exception) is nicely testable. we have defined any terms we thought  that look ambiguous.. We have simple  algorithms and word list with the most common words/meaning in different languages are available, and there are even tools in the translation business for making new word lists for different languages. 


 The hard to test parts is the exception.  IE "unless it will result in a loss of meaning or clarity"


The bench mark for human testability is that 8 out of 10 experts in the topic are confident that they are right. It has to be completely obvious that this is clearer and easier to understand before you use the exception.  That is exactly what we want    If 8 out of ten accessibility testers would not agree that it is clearer to use a less common word  then use the more common word. If you are not sure you can  conform it with user testing (which is  another exception). 


Is that what is intended. Are we understanding it the same way?


note that in many success criteria in wcag part of it is testable and part is less so. For example in 1.1.1 an alt tag needs to serve the same function or purpose as the image.
In fact it never can because part of the images role is aesthetics.  When it first came out you did not often had consensus about the full 1.1.1 was fulfilled. You could get consensus easily whether there was an alt text. But that is all that is fully testable and that is not what wcag requires.




All the best

Lisa Seeman

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