- From: Ian Jacobs <ij@w3.org>
- Date: Tue, 09 Feb 1999 09:54:00 -0500
- To: Denis Anson <danson@miseri.edu>
- CC: Jon Gunderson <jongund@staff.uiuc.edu>, w3c-wai-ua@w3.org
Denis Anson wrote: > > Ian, > > I don't see how we can separate access to web content from access to the web > browser. Without access to the controls of the browser, the user would > necessarily have limited access to the functionality of the browser, and > hence to the web via the browser. I think we are talking about two kinds of access: 1) Access through the user interface 2) Programmatic access. For case (1), the guideline that requires device-independent access to all functionalities offered by the user interface should suffice. For case (2), one can distinguish access to the document structure from control of the user interface proper. I am forwarding the idea that these guidelines should not address programmatic control of user interface controls. It would certainly be interesting to have programmatic control of *everything*, but attempting to achieve that would grind the process of producing these guidelines to a halt. Broad checkpoints such as "Ensure that the user interface follows principles of accessible design" do not belong in this document for similar reasons: we should limit ourselves as much as possible to addressing the accessibility of the content. As I've mentioned in an earlier email, we do address the user interface in several ways: - Device-independence (access to functionality, as well as installation, configuration, and access to help) - Keyboard access - Accessible electronic documentation formats - Configuration profiles Thus, user interface issues do appear in the document. However, I think trying to limit where they appear will enable us to move forward more rapidly. > The mandate of the group is to create guidelines for user agents to provide > access to the web for persons with disabilities. It would seem that the > browser controls fall well within that mandate. I still feel as though general user interface accessibility issues lie outside the scope of this document. Here's a quote from Chuck Opperman from the MIT face-to-face meeting minutes (11 Dec 1999) [1]: <BLOCKQUOTE> This is a very difficult problem: making a user interface and one that's accessible. Not the goal of this group (making content accessible). There are plenty of good references about how to make an interface accessible. Don't ignore the issue, just don't want to spent a lot of time on this issue. Use platform guidelines. Let's worry about HTML-specific issues. </BLOCKQUOTE> [1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/1998/12/wai-ua-f2f-19981211.html#minutes Apparently this is an issue that needs resolution at the next teleconference. > To suggest an extreme case, > suppose a browser were to implement all of the suggest methods of > controlling web content, but were to implement them in a way that made the > use of AT to access those controls impossible? > For example, suppose the > keyboard controls provided were implemented by reading the keyboard > directly, so that there were no hooks for alternative keyboards to control > the program. In that case, the browser could say that it had implemented > the guidelines fully, but it would still be inaccessible to people with > disabilities. We need to guarantee that the browser, as well as its content > is accessible. It's always possible to do something wrong. We should try our best to promote what's right and indicate what's the wrong way to do something, but we cannot prevent someone somewhere from doing the wrong thing. - Ian -- Ian Jacobs (jacobs@w3.org) Tel/Fax: (212) 684-1814 http://www.w3.org/People/Jacobs
Received on Tuesday, 9 February 1999 09:54:55 UTC