Re: Addition to comment 211

Alastair,
I indicated that I would work on this with you. Thanks for the wording – I’ve added it into John’s original text and made some further edits:

<response>

Thank-you for your thoughtful comments and observations, which this Working Group has reviewed. Some comments inline:

All of the new 10 proposed COGA Success Criteria are important elements for people with learning disabilities and should be kept. The extensive descriptions which are provided in the GitHub comments are excellent. We strongly encourage you to keep all of the 10 proposed SC. We appreciate the Plain English Summary.

Thank you. Currently, some of the proposed new Success Criteria (SC) you have commented on appear to be on track for inclusion to the final WCAG 2.1 publication, however there have been some changes to our current Draft that you may not be aware of, and some of the SC you mention have been deferred at this time.

Rest assured however that even though the SC that are not being included in the current draft have not yet advanced forward in the process, these proposed SC have simply been deferred to a later date (potentially a WCAG 2.2, or something similar going forward). The Working Group recognizes the importance of the issues driving these proposals. Deferral is not rejection, and many of these proposed SC simply did not meet the maturity level required to advance at this time.

Additionally, it is during the Public Comment phase that external observers also have the opportunity to review our work, so that the Working Group can solicit and address comments and concerns from the wider community. Based upon that activity, there may be some further adjustments or exclusions, but I am happy to report that at this time it does not appear that this review period has surfaced any significant "show-stoppers".

We did consider each of these and placed them in 2 Priority groups:
(1) First priority:
• Support Personalization (Success Criterion 1.3.4)
• Timeouts (Success Criterion 2.2.6)
• Familiar Design (minimum) (Success Criterion 3.2.7)
• Extra Symbols (Success Criterion 3.1.9)
• Minimize User Errors (Success Criterion 3.3.7)
• Provide Support (Success Criterion 3.3.9)
• Undo (Success Criterion 3.3.8)
• Plain Language (Success Criterion 3.1.7)

(2) Second priority:
• Manageable Blocks (Success Criterion 3.1.8)
• Interruptions (minimum) (Success Criterion 2.2.8)

As you may be aware, WCAG 2.0 currently uses three levels of conformance (A, AA, AAA) which are defined at https://www.w3.org/TR/UNDERSTANDING-WCAG20/conformance.html#uc-levels-head. Currently, most legislation around the planet uses WCAG as their compliance standard, and require (mandate) conformance to Success Criteria at the A and AA levels, while encouraging conformance to AAA Success Criteria when appropriate.
Regarding the decision on the level each SC (A, AA, AAA), this is always a balance between the needs of the user, how difficult it is to implement for website designers/developers, and the availability of support in user agents and assistive technologies.  We appreciate that there are very strong user-needs for some SC that are not currently at A or AA level, however, if the requirement put on website owners significantly increases the difficulty or cost of making web content, there is a risk that the standard is rejected by businesses and governments.

We have added the current proposed conformance level(s) to your list below (while also noting relevant changes to the current Draft Spec, found at https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21).

(1) First priority:
• Support Personalization (Success Criterion 1.3.4)
(IMPORTANT NOTE: This SC has changed, and has now been divided into 2 individual SC:
o Success Criterion 1.3.4 Purpose of Controls (AA) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#purpose-of-controls, and
o Success Criterion 1.3.5 Contextual Information (AAA) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#contextual-information)
• Timeouts (Success Criterion 2.2.6)
(IMPORTANT NOTE: This SC has changed number, and is now Success Criterion 2.2.8 Timeouts (AAA) https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#timeouts)
• Familiar Design (minimum) (Success Criterion 3.2.7)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (A), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #49 (comment))
•	Extra Symbols (Success Criterion 3.1.9)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (AA), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #50 (comment))
• Minimize User Errors (Success Criterion 3.3.7)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (A), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #13 (comment))
• Provide Support (Success Criterion 3.3.9)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (AA), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #32 (comment), #274 (comment))
• Undo (Success Criterion 3.3.8)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (A), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #38 (comment))
• Plain Language (Success Criterion 3.1.7)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (A), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #42 (comment))

(2) Second priority:
• Manageable Blocks (Success Criterion 3.1.8)
(Response: Was proposed at Level (AA), however the Working Group has not reached consensus on this proposed SC so it is deferred for future consideration. #24 (comment))
• Interruptions (minimum) (Success Criterion 2.2.8)
(Response: this is a proposed SC at AAA https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#timeouts)

Many of the improvements needed for people with disabilities are very difficult to get just by using guidelines. For people with cognitive issues especially, it overlaps very closely with general usability issues. In many cases the best method or improving things is with a user-centered design process. 

The Working Group is planning to produce an additional document that will exist as a companion to WCAG 2.1 which includes additional best practices that go beyond WCAG 2.1’s Success Criteria. Several SC proposals, including the deferring COGA items, are expected to be included in this document, and we expect that this document will serve as a useful prompt for additional research and experimentation, as well as identifying areas where additional tool development is needed.

We would very much appreciate additional feedback moving forward. We will be publishing another draft mid-November and welcome comments on the SC in that draft, particularly any information about existing implementations that are similar to the SC, additional information about user impact, and any thoughts on technical challenges in implementing the SC. Ideally, opening one GitHub issue per SC helps the Working Group track issues by SC.

At the risk of repeating the excellent comments already put together in the GitHub documentation, here are a more thoughts on the SC.

Again, thank you for the additional feedback. We will ensure that these comments (benefits and value propositions) are documented with the relevant deferred SC for potential inclusion in the additional companion document mentioned above. We will close this issue, and strongly encourage you to provide additional feedback on the current draft in new GitHub issues.

</response>

Thanks,
AWK

Andrew Kirkpatrick
Group Product Manager, Accessibility
Adobe 

akirkpat@adobe.com
http://twitter.com/awkawk


On 10/24/17, 12:31, "Alastair Campbell" <acampbell@nomensa.com> wrote:

    Hi Lisa,
    
    I think there are a couple of small additions that would help provide meaningful answers to two implicit questions:
    https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgithub.com%2Fw3c%2Fwcag21%2Fissues%2F211&data=02%7C01%7C%7C9322ac8fa4b94f0b952908d51afca872%7Cfa7b1b5a7b34438794aed2c178decee1%7C0%7C0%7C636444594832343630&sdata=Qh5cIdAPwuox18dVAjUkqJBYPHFDMVidTjG0p2YtmGg%3D&reserved=0 
    
    NB: John's response is very good, I'm just picking up on the un-asked questions that Lisa highlighted!
    
    1. Why aren't these important SC higher level?
    
    Regarding which level each SC is specified as, this is always a balance between the needs of the user, and how difficult it is to implement for website designers/developers.  We appreciate that there are very strong user-needs for some SC that are not currently at A or AA level, however, if the requirement put on website owners significantly increases the difficulty or cost of making web content, there is a risk that the standard is rejected by businesses and governments.
    
    Is it possible that you could provide more information on what benefit the SC provide?
    
    2. Are guidelines the right mechanism?
    
    Please note that many of the improvements needed for people with disabilities are very difficult to get just by using guidelines.
    For people with cognitive issues especially, it overlaps very closely with general usability issues. In many cases the best method or improving things is with a user-centred design process. The COGA task force is working on an associated document that provides organisations with the good practice processes that can make all the difference to the result.
    
    Hopefully that's a good starting point, Lisa, could you edit /update that?
    
    Cheers,
    
    -Alastair

Received on Tuesday, 24 October 2017 22:58:22 UTC