Review of HTML5 draft

Hi,

HTML5 has reached a pretty stable point, where most features have been 
specified and the remaining work is mostly tidying up loose ends and 
addressing the thousands of e-mails of feedback we have received over 
the last four or so years.

I would very much appreciate it if people knowledgable in issues relating 
to making Web pages usable for those with sensory and cognitive 
disabilities and those with difficulties using conventional input methods 
could review the HTML5 specification and let me know if there are any 
important issues that need addressing.

HTML5 has a number of new features that are specifically designed to 
address such concerns in as transparent a manner as possible, thus 
hopefully making HTML5 documents usable to all without authors having to 
do anything special. Such features include the new widgets like <input 
type=date>, <input type=range>, <datagrid>, <progress>, <meter>, <bb>, 
<video>, <audio>, list=" and <datalist>, <output>, <details>, <menu>, 
<command>, irrelevant="", and others. We also have a number of new APIs 
for which I would be interested in seeing closer review, e.g. the 
drag-and-drop APIs, contentEditable, the text selection APIs, and so on. 

These have been designed specifically with unusual input and output 
mechanisms in mind, but obviously it's easy for mistakes to slide in 
without us realising, despite our best efforts.

Any input you could have would be much appreciated. If possible, please 
try to send feedback either by e-mail to whatwg@whatwg.org or 
public-html@w3.org, or through bug reports at:
   http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/enter_bug.cgi?product=HTML%20WG

If you send e-mails, please try to keep each e-mail focused on one section 
of the specification, rather than mixing feedback from multiple topics. If 
you file bugs, please try to keep each bug report to one single issue per 
report. This will help expedite responses.

Thanks in advance for any advice you may have,
-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _\  ;`._ ,.
Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.'

Received on Monday, 4 August 2008 17:46:04 UTC