Web and Software: June 27

Miscellaneous

• Meeting minutes approved from June 20, 2007.
• There will be no meeting next week. Next meeting will be July 11.

Review of action items

1. 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.
2. Allen Hoffman will sync provision 2 with AV group definition by next week. - Has not had time to get this done. It will be next week.
3. Andi Snow-Weaver will go back through and look for inconsistent language related to AT.
4. IN PROCESS: Peter Korn and Sean Hayes to think about wording for 21g and provide a rewrite. Vendor should have documented as accessibility within the user interface.
5. IN PROCESS: Sean Hayes will develop a provision that we can propose on resolution of images that enables them to be enlarged and still be readable. This was discussed as part of the "Graphical text used as navigation components" discussion.
   • Latest proposal: 3.2.G. Web pages shall be designed so that visually rendered images can be resized without assistive technology up to 200 percent and down to 50 percent without loss of content or functionality.
   • Concerns with "down to 50%", hardware constraints, and scope (images of text and images of UI controls)
   • no agreement or feedback. It makes sense to hold open until next week when Peter returns from vacation.
   • Several concerns were raised with this proposal:
     • This requirement is not part of WCAG, so we diverge from our goal of harmonization.
     • Availability of tools to address this requirement or support for this in the image format.
     • Allen raised a concern that this could conflict with eGov page size requirements. (Allen to work offline with Terri)
   • DECISION:
     • We will take this proposal off the table and not put it in the draft for Friday.
     • Sean will raise the issue with WCAG.
6. IN PROCESS: Allen Hoffman to develop a proposal for remote access. See thread starting with Allen's post on June 20, 2007.

Technical Topics

Platform Issues

• See Andi's post on June 27, 2007 summarizing where we are.
• Andi reviewed a new proposal to reword item c for Platform issues. Her proposal was "c. Provide a consistent mechanism for providing keyboard focus into and out of an application.
• Concerns were raised by Peter Korn that the reworded item c did not address the concern about access key conflicts. He will post new wording to the list that will be submitted in the draft on Friday (see DECISION below).
• Andi asked Gregg whether a similar guideline was part of ISO. He indicated that this proposed provision looks like the normal things that a platform does, but with accessibility considerations added. They are not covered by ISO.
• Discussion on why the provision was needed in 508. There was a concern about information in the underlying platform not being surfaced to the application directly. This provision was meant to address that problem.
• DECISION: Add this new provision to the draft using the updated wording from Peter for item (c) that addresses the concern with access keys.
• Gregg will review the related ISO provisions and post his review on the list. NOTE: Gregg did post them after the call.

Software Contrast

• See Andi's Post on 6/22/2007
• Andi discussed the updated provision in Software for contrast that was posted to the wiki. The ratio values that were added are consistent with WCAG. Several issues were raised including:
• The provision does not address disabled on inactive elements.
• They must have a lower contrast ratio.
• The WCAG guidelines specifically deal with text and images of text.
• The Software provision should also be limited to text. Oracle indicated they have applications that enable users to specify settings like the contrast of images of text, so that should also be addressed in the provision.
• The statement about default values raised the most concerns. ("Default combinations of foreground and background colors (hue and luminance) should produce a minimum luminosity contrast ratio of 5:1.").
• There was concern about what was the "default". Sean raised the concern that due to the stacking of Windows, this may not be possible.
• DECISION:
  • Specifically that the provision only applies to text and images of text. Remove the sentence about default combinations.
  • Add a statement that the SC is working on a recommendation for default combinations.
  • Add a statement that the provision needs to be modified to address unavailable (disabled) elements.
  • See Peter Korn's posting of the proposed wording with these changes on the list: "When a product permits a user to adjust color and contrast settings, at least one color selection capable of producing a minimum luminosity contrast ratio for text or images of text of 7:1 shall be provided. Default combinations of foreground and background colors (hue and luminance) should produce a minimum luminosity contrast ratio for text or images of text of 5:1, or should use the default settings of the platform. This does not apply to text associated with unavailable user interface elements."

Web - Link Purpose

• Discussion Web - Link Purpose with WCAG 2.0
• Andi discussed the proposed wording for the provision on link purpose and the updates from Jared posted to the list.
• Andi provided a new recommendation that addressed the concerns on the list: "The purpose of each link can be determined from the link text or the link text together with it's programmatically determined link text."
• DECISION: Include the new wording from Andi in the draft.

Software Timing Provision

• Discussion on Timing Provision
• Andi reviewed the proposed wording to harmonize the timing provision with Web, ISO and ANSI. There were several issues:
  • What does "before encountering" mean in the Adjust provision.
  • Tom Brett proposed adding "... and compromising the integrity of the data involved in the activity" to the provision for Essential Exception. Tom was not on the call today to discuss his proposal.
  • We discussed the issue of online testing meeting this provision. It was felt by the group that online testing was covered and no additional changes were needed.
• DECISION:
  • Use the proposed wording on the wiki for the draft.
  • Make a note that clarification is needed for "before encountering".
  • Continue to discuss Tom's recommendation to modify the Essential exception provision on the list.

1194.21(c) Focus Cursor

• Discussion
• We reviewed the reworded proposal for focus cursor. "Software shall provide a well-defined visual indication of which user interface object currently has the keyboard focus. If the object is a text entry field, a visual indication of the text insertion point shall be provided, and is sufficient."
• An issue came from TEITAC that the proposed change does not adequately address "highly visible" or "well-defined" focus cursor. The concern with using "highly visible" is that it is not testable.
• Gregg reviewed the ISO recommendation that defines highly visible in terms of being visibly locatable a specific distance from the display. * Gregg posted the wording to the list for everyone to review. "Software shall provide at least one mode where keyboard focus cursors and text cursors shall be visually locatable by people with unimpaired vision at 2.5 meters when software is displayed on a 38 cm (15 inch) diagonal screen at 1024 x 768 pixels resolution, without moving the cursor.
• EXAMPLE 1: The software provides an option of having a thick rectangle of contrasting color that moves to and outlines the control or field that has keyboard focus. EXAMPLE 2: The software provides an option of having bright, yellow triangles extend from the top and bottom of the text cursor." Gregg felt this was more testable than defining visible based on visual acuity. Some people felt that "unimpaired" vision was too vague. There was a discussion about whether use of the Windows Magnifier could enable you to meet this requirement. Gregg clarified the requirement is to address the visibility of the focus cursor for someone with limited vision who does not use AT.
• Peter Korn asked whether visibility of the focus cursor shouldn't be added to the list of other display attributes in the color/contrast provision. He and Sean will cover this in their work item.
• DECISION:
  • The discussion of whether the focus cursor should be added to the list of other display attributes will be handled by Peter Korn and Sean in their work item.
  • Gregg will post the ISO/HFES guideline on visible cursor to the list. He did this during the meeting.
  • For the Friday draft, we will include the provision as written on the wiki with the following caveats:
    • The SC is still working the issue raised by the TEITAC on a highly visible cursor.
    • This will be reviewed in coordination with the ISO standard as a testable way to define "highly visible".

Authoring Tools Proposal

• Updated Proposal for 27 June 2007
• Discussion from 20 June 2007 teleconference
• We did not have sufficient time to review the complete proposal, but we did review items 1, 2 and 3. There were till concerns and we did not reach consensus.
• For #1 Judy proposed new wording that addressed concerns raised on the list. The new wording: "For each accessible content format supported, authoring tools must all the author to produce content, including any content generated without requiring author input, that complies with applicable Section 508 provisions."
  • Many people liked the revision, but Andrew K. raised a concern that "without requiring author input" was not possible given our definition of authoring tools.
  • We discussed sample tools that produce content without author input, but we didn't close this item.
• Andrew K started to raise concerns with provision #2, but we did not have sufficient time to address them in the call today.
• We had a short discussion of provision #3.
  • Some felt a definition of interoperability was needed.
  • We didn't close on the suggestions and discussion for item #3.
• DECISION:
  • Because we have not had time to close on the discussion, the specific recommendations cannot be added to the draft for Friday.
  • There is still a placeholder for Authoring Tools provisions.
  • The team will continue to work on the list and look at where we are by the end of the week.
  • Judy B. wanted to include a link to the latest proposal in our draft submission so people could see the type of provisions being proposed.
  • Andi did not think this was supported by the Editorial Working Group (EWG). However, once the EWG publishes the new draft, in the section for comments a link could be added.

Project Plan

• Reserve 10 minutes at end of call to discuss where we are on the project plan
• We quickly reviewed the project plan on the wiki.
• Andi has alerted the EWG that we cannot complete all our actions by Friday. Other sub-committees are in the same position. This means there will probably be another draft in late August.
• Still working the Platform issues, but we are close Definitions will be reviewed at our next meeting on July 11
• We will try to close the remaining item on the updated WCAG 2.0 wording on the list.
• Cognitive - still working
• Authoring tools - still working
• Update on content format validation. Peter K completed his review of ODF with the ODF sub-committee. Their view was that it meshes well with the ODF provisions.
• Timing issue on education software was closed today. The group felt the current draft met the requirements.
• Remote access discussion has been kicked off on the mailing list by Allen
• SW on non-PC types of platforms. No one remembers where this issue came from.
• SecondLife has been raised as an issue on the list and will be added as an action.
• Economic assessment is still TBD

Attendees

1. Peter Manyin (Federal Reserve Board)
2. Andi Snow-Weaver - IBM
3. William Loughborough
4. Shannon Rapuano - IBM
5. Jan Richards (ATRC, WAI-AUWG)
6. Peter Korn, Sun Microsystems, Inc.
7. Katie Haritos-Shea
8. Peter Wallack (Oracle)
9. GreggVan
10. Chris Meier
11. ken kipnes (oracle)
12. Eric Damery, Freedom Scientific
13. Don Barrett
14. Jamie Smith
15. terry weaver
16. Alex Li (SAP)
17. Allen Hoffman DHS
18. Amy Chen (Oracle)
19. Jared Smith (NCDAE)
20. Judy Brewer (W3C/WAI)
21. sean hayes (Microsoft)
22. Jim Elekes (Access Board)
23. Andrew Kirkpatrick (Adobe)
24. David Oyola (Ricoh Americas Corporation)
25. Kate Walser (SRA)
26. Angela Hooker
27. Blene Bekure