HTML Accessibility Task Force Teleconference -- 17 May 2012

<trackbot> Date: 17 May 2012

<paulc> is on IRC and will join by phone later if I am needed

<janina> OK, Paul. Thanks.

<janina> Meeting: HTML-A11Y Task Force Teleconference

<janina> Scribe:

scribenick LeonieW

Issue-201 Status

FO: Would like to wrap his up before next week's call.

Issue-199 Status

Issue 199

JS: With people away communication has been difficult.
... Thee has been a conversation with Paul Cotton about postponing the deadline, but no reply yet.

Topic Issue 194

Issue-194Status

JF: There has been some productive discussion. Working on the pattern of what to do with transcripts.
... The challenge is losing the transcript linkage if it isn't part of the <video> element.
... Silvia feels that anything inside the video element is constrained by the bounding box, so positioning a transcript link wouldn't work.
... Proposal is to have a transcript attribute of the video element paired with a transcript element.
... Concern is that authors won't want the transcript link on screen, and will use hide techniques to remove it from the visual UI.

JS: Frank, is it correct that IE takes anything inside the <video> element as constrained by the bounding box?

JF: Frank has dropped from the call.

JS: Would like input on that question from multiple vendors.

JF: The idea of a landmark transcript element is elegant for interactive captions etc. Not sure how it works for a simple download though?

JS: Steve, do you know if anything inside a video element would need to be rendered inside the video frame?

JF: One design pattern is to include the transcript link inside the <video> element. Another is to have a <transcript> element that sits outside of the <video>, paired to the <video> element.

JS: The concern is that anything located inside the <video> has to be rendered inside the video frame.

JF: It's apparently similar to captions. I recall saying that a requirement of captions is that they should be moveable though.

JB: There was a bit of discussion around this. I don't recall the conclusion though.

JF: I need to do some more research on this.
... I've been asked to produce a change proposal by Friday, presumably next Friday (not tomorrow).
... Little bit concerned I'm picking this one up. I'm on it though.

Issue-31C Next Steps

<Judy> Paul, can you ping Cynthia so that she knows that she's needed on 204 before the end of this call?

<Judy> We deferred the agenda order and are taking up other things -- i didn't realize you were in IRC and not on phone hearing that

JB: Metagenerator. We received a review yesterday from the co-chairs.

<paulc> re contacting Cynthia - she does not appear to be online

JB: Multiple points were noted. It may be some core arguments were missed in the co-chair's review. We noted that certain requirements for evidence were effectively a "catch 22".
... Some requests for clarification are addressable. My feeling is that it would be worthwhile to respond to these requests.
... I can have a draft response for the text sub-team's input by next Tuesday, then forward to the HTML Co-Chairs. If there is still a failure to understand the basic accessibility points then this seems an important candidate for a rapid appeal.

JF: I was flabbergasted by the co-chair's review.

<Stevef> paulc: when will the feedback on hgroup issue be forthcoming?

<paulc> Still working on this - other higher priority items ie editor search, media teleconference survey are getting in the way

JB: There is a lack of understanding about basic accessibility, and overall the co-chairs' response on this issue is further damaging to external perspectives of w3c and the html wg's handling of accessibility; john and i have each been receiving mails on this since yesterday..

<paulc> Sorry about that

<Stevef> Paulc: thanks

JS: If there is a reasonable response that can be put together, we should go through the process.

JB: We had requested either a reopen or a review of the proposal. My reading is that we received a review of the reopened proposal. There are multiple accessibility points that the co-chairs didn't understand.

SF: It said that the co-chairs chose not to reopen it.

<Judy> Paul, can you join the teleconf for a minute?

<JF> My initial reaction: because we have no actual evidence that giving a 6-year old an active chainsaw is harmful, we will continue to go ahead and give the 6 year old the chainsaw

<Stevef> "The HTML WG co-chairs have evaluated this request and are not choosing to reopen this issue at this time." http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-a11y/2012May/0094.html

JB: We're having some interuptions in the co-ordinations meetings. Co-chair availability is a bit problematic in the coming weeks. It's a concern.

Issue-204 http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-a11y/2012May/0093.html

JS: John and Cynthia, was it your impression that at the F2F we had agreement to put together a single proposal?

CS: Yes, but I'm not sure Ted was confident he could make it happen.

JF: Yes, similar impression. The three of us worked on the text together.

JS: So Sam's email surprised me, saying they were planning to go ahead with a call for concensus. I've responded to this on list.
... The other wrinkle is that Sam is asking whether we can overcome Benjamin's objections to our concensus. The suggestion is that the objections would also factor in the survey. Benjamin is now asking for time to come up with orthonogal proposals.

JF: There are two change proposals on the table. For Sam to say that one will be discounted is an abuse of process. It should at least go to survey.

JS: The action items for us are to familiarise ourselves with Benjamin's objections.

JF: Benjamin is saying that it shouldn't be allowed to happen. It's already happening, so all we're trying to do is document the truth.

CS: It doesn't happen with hidden content, only content set to display none in IE.

SF: Do you mean HTML hidden or ARIA hidden?

CS: Both. It is a little bit strange.
... They should both be the same I think.

SF: Yes, in all other browsers they are.

CS: Do they special case the accessible name description?

SF: You still get the accessible name.

JF: If a div is hidden using HTML hidden, it can't be described using describedby?

CS: Yes.

JF: But in all other browsers that's not the case?

SF: Right.

JF: So we either have four bugs or one bug. Fair summary?

CS: Yes. From an implimentation point of view this isn't a hard thing to do though.

JF: So either way browser implimentation is uneven. In which case the question becomes if one browser is doing it correctly, we need to file four bugs and move on.

JS: As it stands section 7.1 of the spec isn't correct. It needs to be changed.
... That was the gist of my response to Sam.

CS: Do we know if Sam had consulted with the other chairs?

<Stevef> ok so tested:

JB: The chairs asked us repeatedly to take this kind of statements as being on behalf of the chairs collectively.

<Stevef> works in IE 9 and Firefox 12 (text is not visible in Firefox)

CS: My question was more whether it was an error?

JB: The overall effect is much the same.
... This is a significant concern right now.

JS: Is the Firefox 14 situation a gift that lets us explain things?

JF: Could probably have an example sometime over the weekend.

SF: Why are we doing an off screen anchor for FF?

JS: No, what happens when you put focusable elements inside an off screen element.

<Stevef> http://www.paciellogroup.com/blog/2012/05/firefox-14-image-long-description-via-link-using-aria-describedby/

<paulc> is leaving for the WG meeting

SF: Explanation in the post linked above.
... All they've done is transposed their support of longdesc into describedby.

CS: Is this really so bad?

JS: Yes, because it's breaking legacy support.

SF: The implimentation is still there. The point is that none of the AT use the implimentation. They just look in the DOM if the y find a longdesc.

JF: So you've already built a test page Steve?

SF: Yes.

CS: Could you add in an example that uses an image?

SF: Yes. If you want to make the link navigable by anyone, you make it visible. If you want to make it AT only, you hide it off screen.

JF: ZoomText is going to be supporting ARIA in its next release. That's designed for sighted (low vision), but it's still an AT. What's ZoomText going to go to?

SF: Looking at the image you wouldn't know whether it was longdesc or deescribedby under the hood. I'm curious about this, rather than pro/con.

- DRAFT -

HTML Accessibility Task Force Teleconference

17 May 2012

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