Re: PROPOSAL(revised): User Agent Types

Response to Charles in JRG: 

At 01:24 PM 12/23/98 -0500, Charles McCathieNevile wrote:
>I am going to restate my case after all.
>
>Defining User Agent types is a complex task. Getting them wrong would have
>significant consequences for the utility of any conformance statement, and
>possibly for the guidelines themselves.

JRG: I think if we are vague on defining types, then it will be difficult
for developers to know which guidelines apply to them and which do not.
Developers may think they need to do everything to be compliant and see it
as too big a job and ignore the guidelines.  

I think we want to focus on how information is being rendered in the user
agent types.  

>
>Understanding whether a checkpoint/Guideline is relevant to a particular
>User Agent, based on a conformance statement which includes something like
>
>  Guidelines and checkpoints must be imlemented natively (unless otherwise
>  indicated) by user agents which (natively) render the features in
>  question. Foe example, a monochrome user agent which allows various
>  fonts to be used must implement checkpoints/guidelines which apply to
>  font-family, or size, whereas a speech output device need not. (Of
>  course a speech output device may render different fonts using different
>  voices via some mapping or an audio style sheet)
>

JRG: During auditory rendering I think it should be structural markup like
headers and emphasis that should be used to change speech and not
necessarily changes in font which may be only for visual effect.  

I am not sure we need to worry about monochrome displays in the guidelines.
 But we may want to have a User Agent named KIOSK, that could be a catch
all for all sorts of strange combinations of input and output technologies.  

>requires a small amount of common sense.
>
>Arguing, against a 'common sense understanding' (which is a legally
>sensible formulation in many parts of the world), that one is not required
>to implement a particular guideline, in either case, merely requires a
>good grasp of sophistic logic and rhetoric, and a motive to do so.
>
>Therefore it seems to me that our energy could be better spent working on
>the guidelines and checkpoints themselves.
>
>--Charles McCathieNevile -  mailto:charles@w3.org
>phone: * +1 (617) 258 0992 *  http://purl.oclc.org/net/charles
>       **** new phone number ***
>W3C Web Accessibility Initiative -  http://www.w3.org/WAI
>545 Technology sq., Cambridge MA, USA
>
>On Wed, 23 Dec 1998, Jon Gunderson wrote:
>
>  Do you think these are the user agent types that we should be using?
>  
>  Example of one user agent types with the my understanding of a checklist.
>  Is this what you had in mind?
>  
>  TYPE: Visual Standard (VS) 
>  DESCRIPTION: Rendering of document text content and graphical images on
bit 
>  mapped visual displays with 640x480 pixels or greater resolution with 
>  default font sizes less than 48 point(the font size is only an initial 
>  guess). 
>  CHECKLIST:
>  __ Graphical display of at least 640x480 pixels
>  __ Allows for the rendering of text in multiple font sizes
>  __ Allows for the rendering of document information in more than 2 colors
>  __ Allows the rendering of images
>  __ Provides support for both a full size keyboard and a pointer (mouse) to
>  control nd adjust the user agent
>  EXAMPLES: Mass market user agents like Microsoft Internet Explorer, 
>  Opera and Netscape navigator.
>  
>  
>  At 12:41 AM 12/23/98 -0500, you wrote:
>  >Jon Gunderson wrote:
>  >> 
>  >> I am reposting my orginal proposal with a more explicit statement of
>  >> description and examples of current technology.
>  >> 
>  >> A particular user agent can embody more than one user agent type and
some
>  >> user agents may embody only part of one type (i.e playing audio
files, but
>  >> not video for the MM type).
>  >
>  >Yes, but please recall in my original proposal that a type should
>  >only be defined as a set of checkpoints (techniques). The descriptions
>  >should only be informative.
>  >
>  > - Ian
>  >
>  
>  Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
>  Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
>  Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
>  University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
>  1207 S. Oak Street
>  Champaign, IL 61820
>  
>  Voice: 217-244-5870
>  Fax: 217-333-0248
>  E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu
>  WWW:	http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
>  	http://www.als.uiuc.edu/InfoTechAccess
>  
> 
Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
1207 S. Oak Street
Champaign, IL 61820

Voice: 217-244-5870
Fax: 217-333-0248
E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu
WWW:	http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
	http://www.als.uiuc.edu/InfoTechAccess

Received on Monday, 28 December 1998 09:48:20 UTC