- From: Eric Hansen <ehansen7@hotmail.com>
- Date: Thu, 29 Jun 2000 07:53:26 EDT
- To: w3c-wai-ua@w3.org
Date: 29 June 2000, 7:42 hrs To: UA List From: Eric Hansen Re: "Wish List" for Accessibility Following is my "wish list" for accessibility. These are issues that, if resolved, would make our current job of finishing the UA guidelines easier and help us to it better. Most of these are issues that I have brought up before. 1. Clarify the level or levels at which accessibility claims can/must be made: page, product, presentation, element. 2. Establish in WCAG mechanisms for pairing pieces of content (essential for documenting equivalence claims). 3. Fix the WCAG requirements to allow/require content developers to designate that a piece of content is: primary vs secondary (check usage) and, if applicable, for what profile of technologies and disabilities. This is what is really necessary to fully turn on and off the "alternative content". Otherwise the user agent cannot recognize it all. 4. Establish an ontology for accessibility information (Semantic Web). 5. Refine the definition of multimedia. Catalog their diversity. Establish standard descriptors or modifiers. 6. Refine the definition of non-text elements and text elements. Develop a taxonomy of elements. 7. Refine the definitions of auditory descriptions, collated text transcripts, captions. The current ones are not so much wrong but are incomplete. The are based on the limiting assumption that the Web is a visual/auditory medium. That assumption needs to be challenged. 8. Define primary/secondary(alternative). This distinction ought not be made haphazardly. Unfortunately the usage of terms like equivalent alternative or alternative equivalents makes making such definitions harder. 9. Refine the definition of equivalent. 10. Insert the concept of "message" as part of the "function" that equivalents are attempting to fulfill. 11. Consider possibility that CTT may be interactive or have links to further resources. If it does, then the CTT may be indistinguishable from an "alternative accessible page" 12. Refine definitions of viewports, etc., and their linkages to equivalents, objects, tracks, channels, output devices, etc. 13. Revisit the concept set of reference disability groups. One reason important to establish reference groups -- so that one can establish for which group(s) a given piece of content is to be "primary versus secondary" (check usage). 14. Relate the distinction between multiple media vs multimedia to the notion of standalone vs compementary tracks. 15. Break away from the assumption of the Web as only a visual/auditory medium. 16. Define what kinds of interactivity are possible within a single equivalent. Imagine some of the unusual kinds of multimedia presentations that we have discussed (interactive with links, or static HTML page with audio, or almost anything). Make a collated text transcript. Make captions (which may be very, very simple -- so simple that it moves manually). That is that way to treat a multimedia presentation. Now compare how you would construct an alternative, accessible page. Compare the equivalents for the multimedia presentation and the alternative accessible page. They are essentially the same. 17. Reconsider whether alternative, accessible pages should be discouraged. 18. Write an exposition on considerations that Web content developers should make in determining whether to claim something as a multimedia presentation. Outline which kinds of things (i.e., movie-like things) must almost always be treated as multimedia presentations and which things need not necessarily be treated as such (things that are very nearly audio-only presentations and visual-only presentations; interactive sequences of static pages; manually or automatically scrolling text; blinking text etc.). Web content developers need to suite their claims about what kind of presentation(s) it is and be able to justify it in terms of the definition of equivalent (fulfillment of function, including effectively communication of message). ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com
Received on Thursday, 29 June 2000 07:53:58 UTC