Web and Software: February 28

Review of action items

1. Rich Schwerdtfeger to give a presentation in mid-February on the future of Web and Software applications. Curtis to check with Jim Thatcher about providing a presentation on where graphical applications are going.
2. ONGOING: Gregg Vanderheiden to do some research with the low vision community to see what they want with regard to color and contrast. Gregg is working with Lighthouse exploring the contrast issue. Developing and refining method of defining minimum contrast between text and background. Doing this for WCAG work and will share back with this group. Will post to this group when ready.
3. IN PROCESS: Gregg Vanderheiden, Curtis Chong, Sean Hayes, Don Barrett, Earl Johnson to continue to refine the keyboard proposal for the Web requirements. Need to determine what it is reasonable to ask someone to do and then work on the wording for it. Sean Hayes reported that the keyboard proposal for Web requirements is close to a solution and they would have something posted soon for discussion on the mailing list.
4. Katie Haritos-Shea to develop a proposal for authoring tools requirements and a set of Q&As based on the W3C Authoring Tools Accessibility Guidelines.
5. IN PROCESS: Jim Allan has formulated the appropriate W3C copyright notice and is awaiting approval, then it will be added to all wiki pages that quote W3C provisions.

Technical Topics from Last Week

22(l) and 22(m) and harmonization with WCAG 2.0

• Do we keep 508 and add what’s needed, or use the WCAG 2.0 requirement with a potential for duplicated work?
• Applets and Plugin may have software and Web requirements. User Interface and controls may be separate from the browser. Some prefer the WCAG 2.0 approach of a set of “Web” requirements that can be applied to both “content” that is rendered by user agents and applets and plug-ins that have their own user interface.
• Web requirements will need to include Software checklist items.
• W3 has a new document, “Compound Documents” that may help address this. Currently, it is problematic and still evolving.
• Recommendation that it may be helpful to speak with W3C Web API Group.
• When creating this standard the boundaries should be clear and well defined. Defining all the pieces and how they fit together.
• Action: Allen Hoffman will work on language and platform issues as a starting point for applets and plugins.
• Concern that multimedia developers will not make embedded interactive controls accessible if the requirements are in the software section and not in the A/V section. A provision in the Audio/Video section that requires meeting the software checklist would work. There are a lot of cross references between Audio/Video and other checklists.
• Action: Andi Snow-Weaver to identify additional requirements that would need to be added to 1194.22 for applets and plugins. Review of mapping would be a good starting point

Discussion of Allen's proposal on a document encoding scheme

• Consider including the proposal as a new section.
• Currently assessing a content encoding scheme opposed to what is put into it.
• Multimedia has not been fully addressed but should be.
• Validation should be at the starting point rather than on the end product.
• Authoring requirements should be forthcoming early next week. The authoring tool will support all accessibility attributes of a scheme.
• Should the user agent guidelines be generic?
• Recommendation made to look at W3 Authoring Tool guidelines and User Agent guidelines. This is currently being worked and reduced down to something managable.
• Action: Allen Hoffman will work on proposal for provisions to address authoring tools and user agents.

Cognitive Proposals

Compatibility with assistive technology

• Discussed a software checklist that will ensure the assistive technologies will work.
• Consenus that Andi’s proposal was good, but Peter’s concern that it applies to both the display and authoring text needs to be addressed.
• API requirements proposal should address support for people with cognitive disabilities.
• Assitive technologies that are used for cognitive disabilites that were discussed are:
  • What You Need Now (WYNN)
  • Kurzweil 3000
• Assistive technologies for cognitive disabilities often include:
  • Word prediction
  • Spelling correction and assistance
  • Sound alike phonics
  • Word lookup of definitions
• Action: Andi Snow-Weaver will update the cognitive proposal for compatibility with assistive technologies to address Peter Korn’s concerns, but this can not be closed until the API requirements are done. In addition, regulatory language will be added.

Provision for suppressing unneeded functions

• Recommendation that a Web portal or page should allow users to show or hide information.
• How can we put this into a format for 508? Or should this be an advisory provision?
• Recommendation that we should allow for the user to select from a range of options that would provide a way for the user to prioritize the options that are available.
• The General Interface group is addressing user preferences for accessibility.
• Need to consider two issues:
  • SW Configurability
  • Web Applications (Note: Portlet customization is one area this is applicable.)
• Action: Jamie Smith will provide a concrete proposal for suppressing unneeded functions that can be discussed next week.

Summary of New Action Items

1. Allen Hoffman will work on langauge and platform issues as a starting point for applets and plugins.
2. Andi Snow-Weaver to identify additional requirements that would need to be added to 1194.22 for applets and plugins. Review of mapping would be a good starting point.
3. Allen Hoffman will work on proposal for provisions to address authoring tools and user agents.
4. Jamie Smith will provide a concrete proposal for suppressing unneeded functions that can be discussed next week.
5. Andi Snow-Weaver will update the cognitive proposal for compatibility with assistive technologies to address Peter Korn’s concerns, but this can not be closed until the API requirements are done. In addition, regulatory language will be added.

Attendees

1. Nick Truesdell (IRS)
2. Tom Brett (tcs associates)
3. Andi Snow-Weaver - IBM
4. Allen Hoffman, Department of Homeland Security
5. Jim Allan (W3C)
6. Chuck Letourneau (Industry Canada alt.)
7. Jamie Smith, FL Blind Services
8. Shannon Rapuano - IBM
9. Katie Haritos-Shea
10. Drew LaHart - IBM
11. Blene Bekure (LMIT)
12. Amy Chen (Oracle)
13. Ken Kipnes (Oracle)
14. Laura Ruby
15. Sean Hayes (Microsoft)
16. Luke Kowalski
17. Jessica Brodey (ATIA)
18. Angela Hooker
19. Michael Cooper, W3C
20. Andrew Kirkpatrick (Adobe)
21. David Oyola
22. Sharon Snider - IBM