Re: PROPOSAL: Integrate ARIA attributes into the XHTML namespace

Solves a lot of problems ... +1

- Aaron





From:
Richard Schwerdtfeger/Austin/IBM@IBMUS
To:
"T.V Raman" <raman@google.com>
Cc:
shane@aptest.com, w3c-html-wg@w3.org, w3c-html-wg-request@w3.org, 
wai-xtech@w3.org
Date:
05/20/2008 05:06 PM
Subject:
Re: PROPOSAL: Integrate ARIA attributes into the XHTML namespace



+1

This should also appease the TAG.


Rich Schwerdtfeger
Distinguished Engineer, SWG Accessibility Architect/Strategist
Chair, IBM Accessibility Architecture Review Board
blog: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/blogs/page/schwer
"T.V Raman" <raman@google.com>


"T.V Raman" <raman@google.com> 
Sent by: w3c-html-wg-request@w3.org 
05/16/2008 11:22 AM



To

shane@aptest.com

cc

w3c-html-wg@w3.org, wai-xtech@w3.org

Subject

PROPOSAL: Integrate ARIA attributes into the XHTML namespace







a loud 1+ on this.

Shane McCarron writes:
> 
> (resent to wai-xtech so it is public)
> 
> XHTML 2 and PFWG members,
> 
> I have been following with interest the debate in the TAG regarding the
> mechanism the PFWG has proposed for addressing issues with namespaces
> and support for the ARIA work in non-XML user agents.  I appreciate all
> of the effort that has gone into the debate, and of course understand
> that there are strong opinions on all sides.  In the middle of that
> debate, I read an impassioned plea from Rich for some sensibility, which
> I translated as "Can't we all just get along?"
> 
> In the spirit of that, I tried to think outside the box a little bit -
> just as we did at the f2f meeting in Venice when considering how to deal
> with ARIA-defined values for @role.  Consequently, I propose the 
following:
> 
>    1. Eliminate the private "aria" namespace.
>    2. Incorporate the 'aria-*' attributes into the XHTML namespace.
>    3. Define the attributes in an XHTML M12N-conforming module so that
>       they can be easily incorporated into XHTML Family markup 
languages.
>    4. Make that module "chameleon", just like XHTML Role, so that other
>       languages can easily incorporate the attributes into their own
>       namespace if they choose.
>    5. Ensure that such a definition does not preclude the use in non-XML
>       grammars such as HTML 5.
> 
> I propose this for (at least) the following reasons:
> 
>    1. It costs *us* nothing (there is work for the PFWG, but it costs
>       the XHTML 2 Working Group nothing ;-).
>    2. It promotes the ARIA techniques in the same way that incorporating
>       Ruby or Xforms into the XHTML namespace promoted them - helping
>       ensure they are not viewed as second class technologies.
>    3. It basically eliminates the problems with CSS styling and access
>       to the attributes via JavaScript, including the ability to develop
>       style sheets and scripts that work portably regardless of whether
>       the enclosing document is treated as HTML or XHTML - for the vast
>       majority of use cases, anyway.
>    4. There will only be one "name" for all the ARIA attributes.
> 
> I fully understand that this is not a perfect solution.  I also expect
> that there are people who will continue to object to using a dash for
> scoping instead of the well-defined QName mechanism.  Those objections
> are legitimate and there are long term ramifications to not using
> namespaces when they are appropriate.  However, I think in this case
> relegating these critical accessibility enablers to a non-XHTML
> namespace serves no one, and therefore the use of an alternate namespace
> for this work is inappropriate.  Unfortunately, attempting to
> incorporate the attributes into the XHTML namespace and XHTML markup
> languages without the aria- prefix would be impossible.  There would be
> too many collisions with existing attribute names.
> 
> Ignoring the technical side of the debate, we have a responsibility to
> all members of the web community - and that community includes A LOT of
> people who are being rapidly disenfranchised because accessibility is
> just too damn hard in the Web 2.0 world.  We need to solve this.  And
> solve it now.  I say we embrace the ARIA solution in the XHTML space and
> move on!
> 
> -- 
> Shane P. McCarron                          Phone: +1 763 786-8160 x120
> Managing Director                            Fax: +1 763 786-8180
> ApTest Minnesota                            Inet: shane@aptest.com
> 
> 
> 

-- 
Best Regards,
--raman

Title:  Research Scientist 
Email:  raman@google.com
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