Re: Normative reference to schema.org in EPUB Accessibility?

On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 at 11:51, Matt Garrish <matt.garrish@gmail.com> wrote:

> > So long as the CGs understand that they’re making proposals to an
> independent project (Schema.org) and don’t have exclusive say over schema
> designs
>
>
>
> Absolutely, this is how we’ve approached the accessibility metadata to
> date. The expectation isn’t that we’ll exclusively own the properties
> themselves or have an avenue to add whatever we want. We’re only looking to
> officially reform the work we were doing that led to the submissions, which
> as far as I’m aware at this point is going to largely focus on maintaining
> the taxonomy of values that have been defined in the web schemas wiki. If
> there’s a need for new metadata in the future, we’d go through the same
> process of proposing it for inclusion.
>
>
>
> I don’t know if we want to take on oversight of all accessibility
> metadata, though. I believe the general idea was to limit the group to
> maintaining the taxonomies for the properties we’ve already submitted.
> (Framing the name and description of the group might still be a bit tricky.)
>

Thanks - and yes, the scope concern makes sense. One way to think about
this could be that these properties are similar to cases where a Schema.org
property is designed to take values that are specified and curated by an
external group, for example GS1.org assign product identifiers called
GTINs, and schema.org/gtin represents that.

>
>
> One question that has been raised is whether we need a separate group to
> do this or if it can be done as a “task force” within the existing
> schema.org CG. Do you have a preference?
>
Either can work but I think a task force metaphor works well here

I raised a request over the (north hemispheric) summer to request a new
(tech/implementor) mailing list for Schema.org, public-schemaorg-developers@
—- while this appears to now exist there’s some ongoing confusion on who is
auto-subscribed to the list. Assuming we figure this out, I would be happy
to make a parallel such list for accessibility schema terms.

I have pinged the sysreq thread on that separately, cc:ing Ivan

Dan

>
>
> > and that has equal emphasis on collaborations to *consume* the data,
> since that’s the path to this data being useful
>
>
>
> We’ve been engaged in this in the publishing community group for EPUB. A
> first release of a guide for presenting embedded schema.org metadata is
> soon to be released.
>
>
>
> Matt
>
>
>
> *From:* Dan Brickley <danbri@danbri.org>
> *Sent:* September 10, 2021 7:28 AM
> *To:* Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org>
> *Cc:* Avneesh Singh <avneesh.sg@gmail.com>; Matt Garrish <
> matt.garrish@gmail.com>; Philippe le Hégaret <plh@w3.org>; Ralph Swick <
> swick@w3.org>; W3C Chairs of EPUB 3 WG <group-epub-wg-chairs@w3.org>; W3C
> Public Archives <www-archive@w3.org>
> *Subject:* Re: Normative reference to schema.org in EPUB Accessibility?
>
>
>
>
>
> Hi folks
>
>
>
> On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 at 11:03, Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org> wrote:
>
> Ralph, Philippe,
>
>
>
> here is what we are thinking of doing:
>
>
>
> - a separate W3C community group will be set up, whose sole purpose in
> life will be to be the guardian of the schema.org a11y terms. The CG
> would take over (and clean up) [1]. Once the setup is done, we will also
> have to contact schema.org to make the situation clear (and put some sort
> of redirect from [1] to the new CG's site).
>
> - the a11y specification would directly, and normatively, refer to the
> schema.org vocabulary possibly referring to the Community Group's site,
> too. We believe that type of stability is important for the community.
> There is already a PR showing the differences in the spec[2]
>
>
>
> Is this o.k. with you?
>
>
>
> This would be analogous to other areas where Schema.org often pulls in
> suggestions from a dedicated community with its own (public, open to all
> etc.) discussions.
>
>
>
> Often but not always a W3C CG. For fact-checking schemas (Politifact etc.)
> we (ie Schema.org) engage with experts via the international fact checking
> network (ifcn). For education/learning, the LRMI project is now a part of
> the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative (DCMI), etc. In each case from
> Schema.org’s perspective it is great to have loosely-coupled collaborations
> like this but we are generally conservative about making additive (rather
> than usability/integration) edits unless they’re in the context of an
> application that will actually use/consume the data. See
>
> https://schema.org/docs/howwework.html and nearby.
>
>
>
> So long as the CGs understand that they’re making proposals to an
> independent project (Schema.org) and don’t have exclusive say over schema
> designs, these structures can work well. We have found over the years that
> all topics and domains are rather intermingled and that the idea of
> definitively delegating areas is fraught with difficulty. For example -
> medical schemas vs healthcare information vs factchecking vs local business
> information vs life sciences; we have schemas in all these areas which have
> touched on the coronavirus situation.
>
>
>
> I should also mention that there are other areas of Schema.org that touch
> upon Accessibility, beyond the handful of properties discussed here (eg
> SpeakableSpecification, or anything wrt MediaObject). My advice would be
> for the CG to have a scope that helps its participants engage on Schemas
> for Accessibility in general, and that has equal emphasis on collaborations
> to *consume* the data, since that’s the path to this data being useful
>
>
>
> Cheers
>
>
>
> Dan
>
>
>
>
>
> Thanks
>
>
>
> Ivan
>
>
>
>
>
> P.S. A an aside, the new CG would need a github repository under the w3c
> organization. I hope I have the green light to set up when the time comes.
>
>
>
>
>
> [1] https://www.w3.org/wiki/WebSchemas/Accessibility
>
> [2] https://github.com/w3c/epub-specs/pull/1808
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On 8 Sep 2021, at 22:05, Ralph Swick <swick@w3.org> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> On 2021-09-08 09:37 AM, Ivan Herman wrote:
>
> Ralph, Philippe,
> this type of question comes up regularly, but I did not see any clear cut
> answer.
>
>
> There's no absolute determination in advance; this is intentional.  Each
> case has its own considerations.
>
>
> The EPUB Accessibility spec[1] has a section on package metadata[2] to
> refer to metadata like access mode or accessibility features. The
> specification defines these terms in general, meaning that it is not
> properly defined which terms are to be used in a real metadata
> instantiation; this is left to the separate WG Note on a11y techniques[3]
> which reveals the thinly veiled fact that, in practice,
>
>
> "thinly veiled" is a big flag for me.  The spec should be clear and as
> precise as possible about the Working Group's intentions.  If the WG
> intends that the conformance expectations for an eventual W3C
> Recommendation maximize interoperability with specific metadata usage it
> should state so.  If it believes that the schema.org terms and their
> definitions are the correct solution, it should state so -- and be prepared
> to argue its position with the Director, the W3C Members, and the Community.
>
>
> these general terms refer to their equivalents in schema.org <
> http://schema.org>[4]. Indeed, all the terms defined in [2] are,
> actually, defined in schema.org <http://schema.org>, and those are the
> only mappings for those terms. Those terms are not out of the blue,
> actually: they have been developed, originally, in cooperation with the IMS
> Global[5] and are now maintained on [6].
>
>
> "maintained on [6]" does give me pause.  [6] does not state a maintenance
> policy and refers to an issue tracker that uses the pronoun "I" in many
> places, including its Resolved Issues section, and was last modified on 5
> January 2018.  The parent page (WebSchemas) is explicitly disclaimed as
> "left primarily for historical record".  Is this in fact the authoritative
> place for maintaining the current accessibility vocabulary?
>
>
> The reason of this somewhat weird setting in [2] is to avoid normatively
> referring to schema.org <http://schema.org>.
>
>
> If the WG believes such a normative reference is what the Web needs, it
> should not shy away from stating that.
>
>
>   Actually, the accessibility spec has an earlier version published at the
> ISO, and in ISO land it was a clear no-no to do so. However, W3C is meant
> to be more flexible and therefore the question does arise. However, our
> document on normative references[7] is not 100% clear cut for me.
> Hence this mail: does W3C has an official position as for a normative
> reference to schema.org <http://schema.org> terms?
>
>
> In this, as in many things, if the WG is able to obtain a clear and
> authoritative statement on the stability of the parts it wants to
> normatively reference, the organization (or community) who "owns" that
> stability, and the open process by which the referenced material is
> maintained, that is important to the Director's consideration.
>
>
> Specifically, is it possible to simplify [1] and make a clear reference to
> schema.org <http://schema.org> instead of the hand-weaving approach we
> have there currently? In case of a positive answer, can we, possibly, add a
> reference to schema.org <http://schema.org> in [7] just as we do with the
> WhatWG?
>
>
> It depends on the answers to the questions above (and maybe other
> questions that could arise) :)
>
> -Ralph
>
>
> Thanks for your help
> Ivan
> [1] https://www.w3.org/TR/epub-a11y-11/ <
> https://www.w3.org/TR/epub-a11y-11/>
> [2] https://www.w3.org/TR/epub-a11y-11/#sec-disc-package <
> https://www.w3.org/TR/epub-a11y-11/#sec-disc-package>
> [3] https://www.w3.org/TR/epub-a11y-tech-11/#meta-002 <
> https://www.w3.org/TR/epub-a11y-11/#sec-disc-package>
> [4] https://schema.org/accessMode <https://schema.org/accessMode>
> [5] http://www.imsglobal.org/activity/accessibility <
> http://www.imsglobal.org/activity/accessibility>
> [6] https://www.w3.org/wiki/WebSchemas/Accessibility <
> https://www.w3.org/wiki/WebSchemas/Accessibility>
> [7] https://www.w3.org/2013/09/normative-references <
> https://www.w3.org/2013/09/normative-references>
> ----
> Ivan Herman, W3C
> Home: http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/ <http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/>
> mobile: +33 6 52 46 00 43
> ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0782-2704 <
> https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0782-2704>
>
>
>
>
> ----
> Ivan Herman, W3C
> Home: http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/
> mobile: +33 6 52 46 00 43
> ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0782-2704
>
>
>
>