Analysis of Applicability in UAAG 1.0

Hello,

In light of recent discussion about applicability, a request
from Charles [2] to review the use of the term in the document,
and a proposal from Eric [3] to simplify the model, I have
attempted to analyze how we use the concept of 
applicability in the document. The analysis [1] has three 
parts:

  1) Links to background discussions and issues.
  2) Summary of the six applicability provisions in
     the 18 August draft [4].
  3) Breakdown of how the checkpoints seem to be
     covered by those provisions. 

     a) Some of the checkpoints seem unaffected and
        thus would always apply.

     b) Two of the provisions seem unnecessary and
        can be removed: unsupported technologies,
        unsupported communication.

     c) The other four provisions can be stated
        more succinctly and, according to this
        analysis, should be left in the document.:
        content type, content role, content properties,
        and rendering support.

My hope in doing this analysis was that I would
conclude that applicability was not necessary and
could be removed from the document. This was Eric's
conclusion [3], though his conclusion is based on
the premise that "a checkpoint is applicable to a 
user agent if the checkpoint requires capabilities that
the developer of the user agent intends for users 
without any disability." I haven't been able to
agree with that starting point since there are some
requirements that are principally about features for
users with disabilities (e.g., captions) and others
that are required whether or not the developer intended
them for users without disabilities (e.g., DOM support).

Thus, while I believe that we can get rid of two
of the applicability provisions, so far I have not
been convinced that we can get rid of the remaining 
four. I'm still hoping we can!

 - Ian

[1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/2000/08/uaag10-applic
[2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000JulSep/0031.html
[3] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000JulSep/0225.html
[4] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/WD-UAAG10-20000818

-- 
Ian Jacobs (jacobs@w3.org)   http://www.w3.org/People/Jacobs
Tel:                         +1 831 457-2842
Cell:                        +1 917 450-8783

Received on Wednesday, 23 August 2000 11:30:49 UTC