- From: Ian Jacobs <ij@w3.org>
- Date: Mon, 23 Oct 2000 19:19:14 -0400
- To: w3c-wai-ua@w3.org
Greetings Working Group,
Congratulations! The UAAG 1.0 has returned to (its second)
last call. Below is a copy of the letter I sent to the
W3C Chairs forum a moment ago announcing the beginning
of the review.
Best regards,
- Ian
On behalf of the User Agent Accessibility Guidelines Working Group
(UAWG) [1], I am pleased to announce the publication of the "User
Agent Accessibility Guidelines 1.0" (UAAG 1.0) last call Working
Draft. The document is available at:
http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/WD-UAAG10-20001023/
The last call review period ends 13 November 2000. Please send review
comments before that date to w3c-wai-ua@w3.org (archives [2]). The
UAWG has scheduled this review period based on comments received as a
result of our request to the Chairs [3, W3C Members only].
The Abstract and Status sections of the document are excerpted
below. I look forward to your review comments,
- Ian Jacobs, W3C
Team Contact for the UAWG
DECISION TO GO TO LAST CALL
At their 12 October 1999 teleconference [4], the User Agent Guidelines
Working Group decided to move the UA Guidelines to last call. By
moving to last call, the UAWG indicates that it is seeking feedback
from the larger Web community about this document, especially from
other W3C Working Groups. The UAWG intends for this document to
advance to W3C Recommendation status as described in its charter [9].
WORK SINCE PROPOSED RECOMMENDATION
This last call comes almost one year after the previous last call
review for this document. The Director returned the document to
Working Draft status as a result of comments received during the
Proposed Recommendation review period (which ended 7 April 2000).
Since that time, the Working Group has been revising the document
based primarily on comments that it was difficult to gauge conformance
(refer to a snapshot of the Working Group's issues list [5] with
resolutions to all issues raised during Proposed Recommendation
review). The result of this effort is a document whose scope is more
well-defined, whose minimal requirements have been clarified, and that
is easier to use. The UAWG believes that it has addressed all issues
raised during the Proposed Recommendation review, but has not asked
for explicit sign-off from each Proposed Recommendation reviewer since
the document is moving "backward" to last call rather than forward to
Recommendation.
The list of changes to the Guidelines [6] and the UAWG's active issues
list [7] are available on the Web.
MINORITY OBJECTIONS
Three objections have been recorded in advancing this document
to last call:
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000OctDec/0109.html
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000OctDec/0110.html
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000OctDec/0111.html
There was also one minority objection from the previous round of
reviews:
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000JanMar/0178.html
DEPENDENCIES AND REVIEW
The Working Group thanks all who have contributed to the Guidelines
and Techniques document. The Working Group also thanks in advance
everyone who has committed to reviewing the last call Working Draft.
The list of confirmed reviewers is available [8] on the Web.
The Working Group has identified dependencies with the following W3C
Working Groups. Even if review is not possible, we request that the
Chairs listed below announce their review progress or intentions to
w3c-wai-ua@w3.org.
1) Protocols & Formats Working Group
Co-Chairs: Al Gilman, Daniel Dardailler
2) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines Working Group
Co-Chairs: Gregg Vanderheiden, Jason White
3) Authoring Tools Accessibility Guidelines Working Group
Chair: Jutta Treviranus
4) Education & Outreach Working Group
Chair: Judy Brewer
5) Cascading Style Sheets & Formatting Properties (CSS/FP) Working Group
Chair: Chris Lilley
6) Document Object Model (DOM) Working Group
Chair: Lauren Wood
7) HTML Working Group
Chair: Steven Pemberton
8) Mobile Access Interest Group
Chair: Tatsuya Hagino
9) Synchronized Multimedia (SYMM) Working Group
Chair: Aaron M. Cohen
10) Voice Browser Working Group
Chair: Jim Larson
11) Internationalization Working Group
Chair: Misha Wolf
12) Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) Working Group
Chair: Chris Lilley
NOTE: Editors of W3C specifications that include user interface
requirements as part of conformance are encouraged to "apply" the UAAG
1.0 to their specifications as part of their review of UAAG 1.0. This
will help establish whether the user interface requirements of those
specifications are complete and in line with those of the UAAG
1.0. Reviewers are also encouraged to indicate what user interface
requirements are made by W3C specifications that do not appear
in UAAG 1.0.
IMPLEMENTATION REPORTS ENCOURAGED
The UAWG encourages all last call reviewers to document
implementations known to satisfy the checkpoints. This information
will help the UAWG prepare an implementation report for presentation
to the Director should the document advance to the next stage of the
Recommendation process.
The suggested technique for documenting which user agents (or
combinations of user agents) satisfy the checkpoints is to send email
to w3c-wai-ua (or, if you wish your evaluation to remain confidential
within the team, to wai-ua-review@w3.org) the following information:
- The URI of the document being reviewed (in this case
http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/WD-UAAG10-20001023/)
- A checklist [10] completed with the following information for
each checkpoint reviewed:
* the name and version of the software
components that satisfy the checkpoint,
* the name and version of the host operating system,
* when available, documentation that supports your
assertion (preferably on the Web).
The UAWG has evaluated user agents in the past for purposes of
strengthening the document and building an implementation
report. Refer to the list of user agent evaluations [11].
The Working Group has also published a "Techniques Document" that
explains different ways to satisfy the requirements of the Guidelines.
Comments on this document are also welcome, although it is not in Last
Call. The Working Group does not anticipate moving the Techniques
Document to Recommendation, but to make it a W3C Note
when and if the UAAG 1.0 advances to Recommendation. The
Techniques Document published at the same time as the last call
Guidelines is:
http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/WD-UAAG10-TECHS-20001023/
ABSTRACT OF UAAG 1.0
This document provides guidelines for designing user agents that
lower barriers to Web accessibility for people with
disabilities. User agents include HTML browsers and other software
that retrieves and renders Web content. A user agent that conforms
to these guidelines will promote accessibility through its own user
interface and through other internal facilities, including its
ability to communicate with other technologies (especially assistive
technologies). By following these guidelines, developers will create
more usable software for all Web users.
In addition to helping developers of HTML browsers, media players,
etc., this document will also benefit developers of assistive
technologies because it explains what types of information and
control an assistive technology may expect from a conforming user
agent. Technologies that are outside the scope of this document
(e.g., those for braille rendering) will be essential to ensuring Web
access for some users with disabilities.
STATUS OF UAAG 1.0
This section describes the status of this
document at the time of its publication. Other
documents may supersede this document. The
latest status of this document series is
maintained at the W3C.
This is the 23 October 2000 last call Working
Draft of the "User Agent Accessibility
Guidelines 1.0". This last call review period
ends 13 November 2000. Please send comments
before the review period ends to the public
mailing list w3c-wai-ua@w3.org; public archives
are available.
The previous formally published version of this
document was a W3C Proposed Recommendation, for
which the review period ended 7 April 2000. In
light of Proposed Recommendation review
comments, the W3C Director returned the document
to the User Agent Accessibility Guidelines
Working Group (UAWG) for further work. Since
April, the UAWG has been revising the document
to clarify its conformance requirements and make
it easier to use (refer to the list of changes
to the document). At their 12 October 2000
teleconference, the Working Group decided to
advance the revised document to a second last
call.
To help the UAWG build an implementation report
(as part of advancing the document on the W3C
Recommendation Track), reviewers are encouraged
to evaluate software and indicate (e.g., by
filling out a checklist [UAAG10-CHECKLIST])
which checkpoints that software satisfies.
Note: Three checkpoints in this document
(checkpoint 5.1, checkpoint 5.2, and checkpoint
5.7) refer to three W3C DOM Level 2
specifications ([DOM2CORE], [DOM2HTML],
[DOM2STYLE]) that are expected to become W3C
Recommendations before the UAAG 1.0 becomes a
Recommendation.
Publication as a Working Draft does not imply
endorsement by the W3C Membership. This is a
draft document and may be updated, replaced or
obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is
inappropriate to cite W3C Working Drafts as
other than "work in progress."
This document is part of a series of
accessibility documents published by the Web
Accessibility Initiative (WAI) of the World Wide
Web Consortium (W3C). WAI Accessibility
Guidelines are produced as part of the WAI
Technical Activity. The goals of the User Agent
Accessibility Guidelines Working Group are
described in the charter.
A list of current W3C Recommendations and other
technical documents can be found at the W3C Web
site.
[1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/
[2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/
[3] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Member/chairs/2000JulSep/0125.html
[4] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-ua/2000OctDec/0083.html
[5] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/2000/10/lc-issues
[6] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/wai-ua-wd-changes.html
[7] http://server.rehab.uiuc.edu/ua-issues/issues-linear.html
[8] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/2000/09/reviewers-last-call-2.html
[9] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/wai-ua-charter
[10] http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/WD-UAAG10-20001023/uaag10-chktable
or http://www.w3.org/TR/2000/WD-UAAG10-20001023/uaag10-chklist
[11] http://www.w3.org/WAI/UA/Evaluations
--
Ian Jacobs (jacobs@w3.org) http://www.w3.org/People/Jacobs
Tel: +1 831 457-2842
Cell: +1 917 450-8783
Received on Monday, 23 October 2000 19:19:16 UTC