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Number of posts in this thread: 11 (In chronological order)

From: Lucy Greco
Date: Tue, Oct 22 2013 12:06PM
Subject: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Hello:
As some of you may be aware UC just past a new access policy that
requires W3c 2.0 as for any new development and or purchases. And I have
been asked to participate in the first RFP that will be requiring this.
it's so new I don't have any documentation created yet about How to look
for and or check for this standard when evaluating venders. That long
winded explanation is to ask what if anything is the equivalent of the
VPAT for W3C 2.0 a and or aa or aaa thanks Lucy

Lucia Greco
Web Access Analyst
IST-Campus Technology Services
University of California, Berkeley
(510) 289-6008 skype: lucia1-greco
http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
Follow me on twitter @accessaces

From: Jonathan Metz
Date: Tue, Oct 22 2013 1:58PM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Hi Lucia,

I sat in on a Section 508 training about a month or so ago. Bruce Bailey
of the Access Board was presenting about Section 508 Refresh weighing
heavily on WCAG 2.0. He made the recommendation that agencies start
applying WCAG to their projects now rather than later and they should do
so because of his interpretation of 1194.5.

Someone on Twitter recently asked what VPATs will be replaced with, and
Jared Smith suggested (ideally) the levels of conformance
<http://juicystudio.com/article/wcag-baseline-concept.php>; 'without all
the extra silly stuff
<http://www.w3.org/TR/UNDERSTANDING-WCAG20/conformance.html>;¹.

Bruce and his co-presenter did state that the government will not be
looking at conformance claims. I did ask Bruce after the meeting about how
agencies should start to conduct required market research and he mentioned
that there wouldn't be anything available to replace the GPAT (which is
where we get VPATs from). He said that the current iteration was (he
thought) based on something HHS had put out. The VA took it and it ran
from there.

My opinion would be to maybe bastardize something from WebAIM's checklist
<http://webaim.org/standards/wcag/checklist>; and combine it somewhat with
the levels of conformance from Gez's site up above. We may even see some
other agency come up with a solution (like how we got it now), but
hopefully it makes more sense. A colleague from another company told me
recently that he came across something asking for a ŒPAT¹, or Product
Accessibility Template. He said it looked a little different, but I wasn¹t
able to see an example.

I can¹t imagine that there would be much need/reason to put any sort of
emphasis on AAA, since there is nothing in Section 508 Refresh that merits
anyone ever going above level AA. So maybe that makes it easier to create
a checklist to determine which vendors are up to snuff.

HTH,


Jon





On 10/22/13 2:06 PM, "Lucy Greco" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:

>Hello:
> As some of you may be aware UC just past a new access policy that
>requires W3c 2.0 as for any new development and or purchases. And I have
>been asked to participate in the first RFP that will be requiring this.
>it's so new I don't have any documentation created yet about How to look
>for and or check for this standard when evaluating venders. That long
>winded explanation is to ask what if anything is the equivalent of the
>VPAT for W3C 2.0 a and or aa or aaa thanks Lucy
>
>Lucia Greco
>Web Access Analyst
>IST-Campus Technology Services
>University of California, Berkeley
>(510) 289-6008 skype: lucia1-greco
>http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
>Follow me on twitter @accessaces
>>>

From: John E Brandt
Date: Tue, Oct 22 2013 2:03PM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Hi Lucia, I'm not sure I understand your question.

The current Section 508 rules have six sets of Technical Standards. Five are
related to the acquisition (i.e., procurement) of hardware and software. The
sixth part is related to "Web-based intranet and internet information and
applications" - the part we generally refer to when reviewing the
accessibility of websites. As I understand the discussion so far, the
recommendation for what is being called the "refresh" of Section 508 is to
have that web accessibility section - subpart 1194.22 Web-based intranet and
internet information and applications - become more consistent with the
(newer) WAI-WCAG version, as well as, Section 255 - Telecommunications Act
Accessibility Guidelines of December 2012.

The Voluntary Product Accessibility TemplateR, or VPATR, is a tool used to
document a product's conformance with the accessibility standards under
Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act. It was developed by a trade agency,
the Information Technology Industry Council (ITIC) and not the federal
government. See http://www.itic.org/public-policy/accessibility and see
also
http://www.essent.com/News/Blog/Understanding-Section-508-Compliance-and-VPA
T-284-37.htm

I suspect that the ITIC will come out with a new VPAT template after the
Access Board has promulgated the final rules revisions to Section 508.

From your message, it appears University of California is sort of jumping
ahead of the federal government and adopting the WAI-WCAG version 2
guidelines. I would assume that if the University of California has adopted
new policy, they have established a new set of rules - apparently not? Maybe
they want you to write the rules!

Remember that WAI-WCAG is not a set of guidelines for the procurement of
hardware and software. But, that said, you may want to take a look at this
document, "Guidance on Applying WCAG 2.0 to Non-Web Information and
Communications Technologies (WCAG2ICT) ... which describes how the Web
Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 [WCAG20] and its principles,
guidelines, and success criteria can be applied to non-web Information and
Communications Technologies (ICT), specifically to non-web documents and
software. It provides informative guidance (guidance that is not normative
and does not set requirements)." Find this document here:
http://www.w3.org/TR/wcag2ict/

As others have pointed out here in the group, the "refresh" of Section 508
is still months (years?) in the future. The proposed rules are on the Access
Board website.


~j

John E. Brandt
jebswebs: accessible and universal web design,
development and consultation
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
207-622-7937
Augusta, Maine, USA

@jebswebs

From: Andrews, David B (DEED)
Date: Tue, Oct 22 2013 2:46PM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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John, many places are already using WCAG 2.0 our legislation in Minnesota passed in 2009 and the regulations were adopted in September of 2010.

Dave

From: Andrew Kirkpatrick
Date: Tue, Oct 22 2013 9:04PM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Lucy,
There isn't an official way to deliver this information yet. The VPAT format was created by ITI and I expect that the discussions that have taken place by ITI and others related to adapting the VPAT for the new rules will someday need to be done at a less leisurely pace than has been the case for the last several years of waiting for the new rules.

Canadian customers are asking for the same thing as you and I suspect that Australian and customers from other countries have done so also. Absent a standard way of representing this information, we've made a simple document that is similar to the VPAT but uses WCAG 2.0. I expect that it will change at some point, but that the underlying product compliance data will be (hopefully) unchanged. Here's an example: http://www.adobe.com/accessibility/compliance/adobe-social-3-wcag-compliance.html

Thanks,
AWK

Andrew Kirkpatrick
Group Product Manager, Accessibility
Adobe Systems

= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
http://twitter.com/awkawk
http://blogs.adobe.com/accessibility

From: Lucy Greco
Date: Tue, Oct 22 2013 9:50PM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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This is all good information everyone is sending to me. Keep it coming.
this is a project UC is going to need to go through quickly in the next
few months. We will post whatever we come up with in the near future . If
there is interest I will put something on my blog about the document when
its live. Lucy

Lucia Greco
Web Access Analyst
IST-Campus Technology Services
University of California, Berkeley
(510) 289-6008 skype: lucia1-greco
http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
Follow me on twitter @accessaces

From: Brian Richwine
Date: Thu, Oct 24 2013 2:48PM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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We've looked at the AG Accessibility Checklist 2, located here:
http://www.accessibility-checklist.ch/#en

However it is very HTML specific.

-Brian

On Tue, Oct 22, 2013 at 11:50 PM, Lucy Greco < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:

> This is all good information everyone is sending to me. Keep it coming.
> this is a project UC is going to need to go through quickly in the next
> few months. We will post whatever we come up with in the near future . If
> there is interest I will put something on my blog about the document when
> its live. Lucy
>
> Lucia Greco
> Web Access Analyst
> IST-Campus Technology Services
> University of California, Berkeley
> (510) 289-6008 skype: lucia1-greco
> http://webaccess.berkeley.edu
> Follow me on twitter @accessaces
>
>

From: Balakumar Sujatha [Contractor]
Date: Thu, Oct 31 2013 6:36AM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Lucy,

The most important thing to do in the RFP is to ensure that the contract is strong and you specify a WCAG 2.0 test plan as part of the deliverables and acceptance criteria. Your best bet would be to incorporate adherence to WCAG 2.0 in the contract. The burden now falls on the vendors to be WCAG 2.0 compliant as they are contractually bound. The vendor should fill a 508/accessibility test plan on completion of contract to state how the end deliverable is WCAG 2.0 compliant.

In terms of evaluating vendors, ask the vendors for capability statement - that states how the vendor is going to accomplish WCAG 2.0 technical requirements. This is a good way to evaluate the vendors knowledge and capability. The person who evaluates these statements should have decent knowledge of accessibility of course.

A VPAT is just voluntary and not contractually binding. Hope this helps.

Sujatha

>

From: Balakumar Sujatha [Contractor]
Date: Thu, Oct 31 2013 6:51AM
Subject: Re: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Also remember to specify in the RFP :

The Contractor shall perform Manual Testing (which will also include utilizing the keyboard, navigating the system, and reviewing code), Automated Testing, and Assistive Technology (AT) Testing

Thank you.
Sujatha

From: Terhaar, Nina A (MNIT)
Date: Thu, Oct 31 2013 8:12AM
Subject: Re: FW: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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What Assistive Technology (AT) testing do you think would be considered "standard" for compliance?

Thx.

NINA A. TERHAAR | APPLICATIONS ARCHITECT
MN.IT SERVICES @ DHS
651-431-2144 (w) | = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
Information Technology for Minnesota Government | mn.gov/oet

From: Morin, Gary (NIH/OD) [E]
Date: Thu, Oct 31 2013 12:58PM
Subject: Re: FW: 508 asks for a VPAT what does W3C have that's similar
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Speech Recognition software (e.g., Dragon Naturally Speaking), even though it's almost universally excluded - keyboard access really doesn't help everyone.

I think this list for testing is fairly current (in terms of versions) - it's partly based on what AT is commonly in use at Federal agencies and is what is provided by CAP (http://www.cap.mil/). a broader audience will, of course, require much more flexibility, for your lowest common denominator.

a. Screen Readers
i. JAWS 13.0 and JAWS 14.0<http://www.freedomscientific.com/>; (http://www.FreedomScientific.com)
ii. NVDA<http://www.nvda-project.org>; (http://www.nvda-project.org/ or http://www.nvaccess.org/)
iii. Window-Eyes 8.3<http://www.gwmicro.com/>;
iv. SuperNova Screen Reader (formerly Hal)<http://www.yourdolphin.com/productdetail.asp?id=5>;
b. Screen Magnifiers
i. MAGic 11.0<http://www.freedomscientific.com/products/lv/magic-bl-product-page.asp>;
ii. ZoomText 9.1<http://www.AISquared.com>;
c. Speech Recognition Software<http://cap.tricare.mil/Solutions/ProductCategory.aspx?DisabilityID=1&;CategoryID=29&SolutionType=Products>
i. Dragon Naturally Speaking, Medical 10.0
ii. Dragon Naturally Speaking, Professional 12.5<http://www.cap.mil/>;

Gary