WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

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Re: WebAIM-Forum Digest, Vol 129, Issue 1

for

From: Julie Lewis
Date: Dec 1, 2015 2:10PM

>>
>>From: Cliff Tyllick < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>>
>>>>>
>>>>>On Nov 30, 2015, at 9:07 AM, Julie Lewis < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>>>>>wrote:
>>>>>Is there any reason the accessibility community can¹t use github for
>>>>>this?
>>>>>We could even maintain a plain language version of the WCAG
>>>>>recommendations there. ;^)
>>>>>>2. The accessibility community should build and maintain an
>>>>>>application any Web professional can use to discover known
>>>>>>techniques for producing usable and accessible interactions in
>>>>>>the presentation technology they are using.
>>
>>>Julie, it matters who hosts it because the host is the entity that
>>>affirms that these are valid solutions. If it's produced by everyone on
>>>this list collaborating as friends of mine, then the attorneys who
>>>opine on whether a corporation is protected from the risk of having
>>>done the wrong thing will say, "Well, that's interesting, but it's just
>>>what Cliff's friends say. What does the body that made the standards
>>>say?"
>>>
>>>But if the very same people do the very same work as a working group of
>>>the WAI, those attorneys will say, "Yes, our developers and project
>>>managers can adequately reduce our risk by using these tools, because
>>>the body that developed the standards also developed these tools."
>>
>>

OK maybe I wasn't clear. You talk about "the accessibility community"
developing and maintaining a tool. (That doesn't sound "authoritative" to
me.) In fact that tool already exists.

It is possible to create and host your own github repository - many
private companies use it this way for source control. But then I think
you lose the visibility and "street cred" that github has with developers.
And it costs $.

Either way - you set up the project so that one or more people act as
gatekeepers for any code or documentation, that someone wants to add to
the repository. WAI - or whatever organization is deemed authoritative -
would create the project and set themselves up as gatekeeper(s).

Even better - github lets anyone "clone" the project so they have a local
copy that they can do whatever they need to with. That is what it is made
for. If they make improvements, they can request that the improvements be
reviewed by WAI - who can either accept and add them to the master, or
reject them for whatever reason. All documented, all done in the open.

My point is that "hosting" is different from "control". The tool can be
hosted anywhere, what is important is who controls what gets added to the
repository.

And note message 12. WCAG is already using github for the spec.