Groups
A variety of W3C groups
enable W3C to pursue its mission through the creation
of Web standards, guidelines, and supporting
materials.
Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines
The Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines Working Group is chartered to maintain and support the Authoring Tool Accessibility
Guidelines 1.0 W3C Recommendation, and develop ATAG 2, a second version of these authoring tools accessibility guidelines.
Contact: Jeanne Spellman
Cascading Style Sheets (CSS)
The mission of the group is to develop and maintain CSS.
Contacts: Chris Lilley, Bert Bos
Compound Document Formats
The mission of the W3C Compound Document Formats (CDF) Working Group is to continue to develop specifications which combine selected existing document formats from the W3C and elsewhere, and which specify the runtime behavior of such combined documents.
Contact: Doug Schepers
Device APIs and Policy
The mission of the Device APIs and Policy Working Group is
to create client-side APIs that enable the development of Web Applications and
Web Widgets that interact with devices services such as Calendar, Contacts,
Camera, etc. Additionally, the group will produce a framework for the
expression of security policies that govern access to security-critical APIs
(such as the APIs listed previously).
Contacts: Thomas Roessler, Dominique Hazaël-Massieux
Education and Outreach
The mission of the Education and Outreach
Working Group (EOWG) is to develop strategies, and awareness
and training resources, to educate a variety of audiences regarding
the need for Web accessibility and approaches to implementing Web
accessibility.
Contact: Shawn Henry
Efficient XML Interchange
The main objective of the Efficient XML Interchange (EXI) Working Group is to develop a
format that allows efficient interchange of the XML Information Set.
Contact: Carine Bournez
Evaluation and Repair Tools
The mission of the Evaluation and Repair Tools Working Group (ERT WG) is to develop techniques and resources to facilitate the evaluation and repair of Web sites with regard to their conformance to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0, and to facilitate testing across all three WAI guidelines also including the Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines and User Agent Accessibility Guidelines.
Contact: Shadi Abou-Zahra
Forms
The
mission of the Forms Working Group is to
develop specifications to cover
forms on the Web, producing a system that scales from
low-end devices through to the enterprise level.
Contact: Steven Pemberton
Geolocation
The mission of the Geolocation Working
Group is to define a secure and
privacy-sensitive interface for using client-side location information in
location-aware Web applications.
Contact: Matt Womer
HTML
The mission of the HTML Working Group is to continue the
evolution of HTML (including classic HTML and XML syntaxes).
Contact: Michael(tm) Smith
Internationalization Core
The mission of the Internationalization
Core Working Group is
to enable universal access to the World Wide Web by proposing and
coordinating the adoption by the W3C of techniques, conventions,
technologies, and designs that enable and enhance the use of W3C technology
and the Web worldwide, with and between the various different languages,
scripts, regions, and cultures.
Contact: Richard Ishida
Math
The mission of the Math Working Group is to facilitate and promote
the use of the Web for mathematical and scientific communication. The
main purpose of the Working Group is to improve and extend the
functionality of the MathML 2.0
(Second Edition) Recommendation (W3C Recommendation, 21 October
2003) in light of several years of experience of large-scale deployment
by many individuals and organizations.
Contact: Bert Bos
Media Annotations
The mission of the Media Annotations
Working Group is to provide an ontology
designed to facilitate cross-community data integration of information related
to media objects in the Web, such as video, audio and images.
Contact: Thierry Michel
Media Fragments
The mission of the Media Fragments Working Group is to address temporal and spatial media fragments
in the Web using Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI).
Contacts: Thierry Michel, Yves Lafon
Mobile Web Best Practices
The mission of the Mobile Web Best Practices
Working Group (BPWG) is to
develop a set of technical best practices and associated materials in support
of development of web sites that provide an appropriate user experience on
mobile devices.
Contacts: Dominique Hazaël-Massieux, François Daoust
Mobile Web Initiative Test Suites
The mission of the Mobile Web Initiative Test Suites
Working Group is to help create a strong foundation for the mobile
Web through the development of a set of tests suited for browsers on mobile
devices.
Contact: Dominique Hazaël-Massieux
Multimodal Interaction
The mission of the Multimodal Interaction Working
Group is to develop open standards that enable
the extension of the Web to allow multiple modes of interaction (GUI, speech, vision, pen, gestures, haptic interfaces, …) for anyone, anywhere, on any device, at any time.
Contact: Kazuyuki Ashimura
OWL
The OWL Web Ontology Language is playing an important role in an increasing number and range of applications, and is the focus of research into tools, reasoning techniques, formal foundations and language extensions. The mission of the OWL Working Group is to produce a W3C Recommendation that refines and extends OWL.
Contacts: Ivan Herman, Sandro Hawke
Protocol for Web Description Resources (POWDER)
The mission of the Protocol for Web Description Resources (POWDER) Working
Group is to develop a mechanism through which structured metadata
("Description Resources") can be authenticated and applied to groups of Web
resources and that allows retrieval of the description resources without
retrieval of the resources they describe.
Contact: Matt Womer
Protocols and Formats
The mission of the Protocols
and Formats Working Group (PFWG) (Member Confidential
PFWG) is
to increase the support for accessibility in Web specifications. This
mission flows from the W3C mission of promoting universal access and
interoperability across the Web.
Contact: Michael Cooper
RDB2RDF
The mission of the RDB2RDF Working Group is to standardize a language for mapping relational data and relational database schemas into RDF and OWL.
Contact: Harry Halpin
Rule Interchange Format
The Working Group is to specify a format for rules, so they
can be used across diverse systems. This format (or language)
will function as an interlingua into which established and new
rule languages can be mapped, allowing rules written for one
application to be published, shared, and re-used in other
applications and other rule engines.
Contact: Sandro Hawke
SOAP-JMS Binding
The mission of the SOAP-JMS Binding Working Group is to produce a
W3C Recommendation for how SOAP should bind to a transport that supports the
Java™ Message Service (JMS) api by refining the “SOAP over Java™ Message
Service 1.0” Member Submission. In the case of SOAP 1.2 this binding
must use the SOAP Protocol
Binding Framework defined by the XML Protocol Working Group.
Contact: Yves Lafon
SPARQL
The mission of the SPARQL Working Group is to develop SPARQL, the query language for the Semantic Web. The scope of its current charter is to extend SPARQL technology to include some of the features that the community has identified as both desirable and important for interoperability based on experience with the initial version of the standard.
Contacts: Ivan Herman, Sandro Hawke
SVG
The mission of the SVG Working Group is to continue the evolution of Scalable Vector Graphics as a format and a platform, and enhance the adoption and usability of SVG in combination with other technologies.
Contacts: Doug Schepers, Chris Lilley
SYMM
The mission of the SYMM Working Group is to continue W3C’s
work on synchronized multimedia that started with SMIL 1.0, SMIL 2.0. Its main
contribution is extending the functionality contained in the current SMIL 2.0 Recommendation.
Contact: Thierry Michel
Semantic Web Deployment
The Semantic Web Deployment Working Group provides consensus-based guidance on issues of practical RDF development and deployment practices in the areas of publishing vocabularies, OWL usage, and integrating RDF with HTML documents (e.g. through RDFa).
Contact: Ralph Swick
Service Modeling Language
The mission of the
Service Modeling Language (SML) Working Group
is to produce W3C
Recommendations for Service Modeling Language by refining the
“Service Modeling Language” (SML) Member
Submission, addressing implementation experience and feedback
for the specifications. SML defines extensions to the W3C XML Schema
language by adding support for inter-document references and
user-defined constraints. This combination of features is very
useful in building complex multi-document models that capture
structure, constraints, and relationships. In the management
domain, these models are typically used to automate
configuration, deployment, monitoring, capacity planning,
change verification, desired configuration management,
root-cause analysis for faults, etc.
Contact: Henry S. Thompson
Timed Text
The mission of the Timed Text Working Group is to produce a W3C Recommendation for media
online captioning by refining the W3C specification Timed Text (TT)
Authoring Format 1.0 — Distribution Format Exchange Profile
(DFXP) based in implementation experience and interoperability
feedback.
Contact: Philippe Le Hégaret
Ubiquitous Web Applications
The Ubiquitous Web Applications
Working Group seeks to simplify the creation of distributed Web
applications involving a wide diversity of devices, including desktop
computers, office equipment, home media appliances, mobile devices (phones),
physical sensors and effectors (including RFID and barcodes). This will be
achieved by building upon existing work on device independent authoring and
delivery contexts by the former DIWG, together with new work on
remote eventing, device coordination and intent-based events.
Contact: Matt Womer
User Agent Accessibility Guidelines
The mission of the User Agent Accessibility Guidelines Working
Group is to produce guidelines for the
development of accessible user agents: software that retrieves and renders
Web content, including text, graphics, sounds, video, images, etc. In
particular, the groups seeks to support the implementation of the User Agent
Accessibility Guidelines 1.0 , and to collect requirements for a subsequent
version of User Agent Accessibility Guidelines.
Contact: Jeanne Spellman
Voice Browser
The mission of the Voice Browser Working Group is to
enable users to speak and
listen to Web applications by creating standard languages for
developing Web-based speech applications. The Voice Browser Working
Group concentrates on languages for capturing and producing speech
and managing the dialog between user and computer, while a related
Group, the Multimodal Interaction Working Group,
concentrates on additional input modes including keyboard and
mouse, ink and pen, etc.
Contacts: Matt Womer, Kazuyuki Ashimura
Web Applications
The mission of the Web Applications (WebApps) Working
Group is to provide specifications that enable improved client-side
application development on the Web, including specifications both for
application programming interfaces (APIs) for client-side development
and for markup vocabularies for describing and controlling client-side
application behavior.
Contacts: Doug Schepers, Michael(tm) Smith
Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
The mission of the Web Content
Accessibility Guidelines Working Group is to develop
guidelines to make Web content accessible for people with disabilities. In
particular, the group is responsible for the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines
2.0 as a W3C Recommendation.
Contact: Michael Cooper
Web Security Context
The mission of the Web Security Context Working Group is to specify a baseline set of security context information that should be accessible to Web users, and practices for the secure and usable presentation of this information, to enable users to come to a better understanding of the context that they are operating in when making trust decisions on the Web.
Contact: Thomas Roessler
Web Services Policy
The
mission of the Web Services Policy Working Group is to
produce W3C Recommendations for Web Services Policy by refining the
“WS-Policy” Member Submission, addressing
implementation experience and interoperability feedback from the
specifications, maximizing compatibility with existing policy assertions and considering composition with other components
in the Web services architecture.
Contact: None
Web Services Resource Access
The mission of the
Web Services
Resource Access Working Group is to
produce W3C Recommendations for a set of Web Services
specifications by refining the WS-Transfer,
WS-ResourceTransfer,
WS-Enumeration,
WS-MetadataExchange and WS-Eventing
Member Submissions , addressing existing issues in those
specifications, implementation experience and interoperability
feedback from implementers and considering composition with other
Web services standards. The submitted specifications define SOAP-based
mechanisms for interacting with the XML representation behind a
resource-oriented Web Service, accessing metadata related to that
service, as well as a mechanism to subscribe to events related to
that resource.
Contact: Yves Lafon
WebCGM
The WebCGM Working Group is working on integrating some of the requirements that were identified but not included in the development of WebCGM 2.0 into a WebGGM 2.1
specification.
Contact: Thierry Michel
XHTML2
The
mission of the XHTML2 Working Group is to fulfill
the promise of XML for applying XHTML to a wide variety of platforms with
proper attention paid to internationalization, accessibility,
device-independence, usability and document structuring. This mission
includes providing
an essential piece for supporting rich Web content that combines XHTML
with other W3C work on areas such as math, scalable vector graphics,
synchronized multimedia, and forms, in cooperation with other Working Groups.
Contact: Steven Pemberton
XML Core
The mission
of the XML Core Working Group is to maintain and develop as needed
core XML specifications.
Contact: Henry S. Thompson
XML Processing Model
The XML Processing Model Working Group is defining XProc, an XML-based language that allows the creator of any given XML document to indicate that operations on that document should be performed in a specific order for a particular result, and if so, how to apply those operations.
Contact: Henry S. Thompson
XML Query
The mission of the XML Query Working Group is to provide flexible query facilities to extract data from
XML and virtual documents, such as contents of databases or other persistent
storage that are viewed as XML via a mapping mechanism, on the Web.
Contact: Liam Quin
XML Schema
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
Contact: Henry S. Thompson
XML Security
The mission of the XML Security Working
Group is to take the next step in developing
the XML security specifications.
Contact: Thomas Roessler
XSL
The mission of the XSL Working Group is to define and maintain
a practical style and transformation language
capable of supporting the transformation and presentation of, and interaction
with, structured information (e.g., XML documents) for use on servers and
clients. The language is designed to build transformations in support of
browsing, printing, interactive editing, and transcoding of one XML
vocabulary into another XML vocabulary. To enhance accessibility, XSL is able
to present information both visually and non-visually. XSL is not intended to
replace CSS, but will provide functionality beyond that defined by CSS, for
example, element re-ordering.
Contacts: Liam Quin, Carine Bournez
HTML5 Japanese
The mission of the HTML5 Japanese Interest Group, part of the HTML Activity, is to facilitate focused discussion in Japanese of the HTML5 specification and of specifications closely related to HTML5, to gather comments and questions in Japanese about those specifications, to collect information about specific use cases in Japan for technologies defined in those specifications, and to report the results of its activities as a group back to the HTML Working Group, as well as to other relevant groups and to the W3C membership and community.
Contacts: Michael(tm) Smith, Masao Isshiki, Kazuyuki Ashimura
Internationalization (I18n)
The mission of the Internationalization
(I18n) Interest Group is
to help the Working Groups within the Internationalization Activity and
provides a forum to discuss issues related to the internationalization of the
Web.
Contact: Richard Ishida
Internationalization Tag Set (ITS)
The
Internationalization Tag Set Interest Group
is a forum to foster a community of users of the Internationalization Tag
Set (ITS), by promoting its adoption, and gathering information on
its further development.
Mobile Web For Social Development (MW4D)
The mission of the
Mobile Web For Social
Development (MW4D) Interest Group is to explore the potential of Web technologies on Mobile
phones as a solution to bridge the Digital Divide and provide Information and
Communication Technology (ICT) based services to rural communities and
underprivileged populations of Developing Countries.
Contact: Stéphane Boyera
Patents and Standards
The Patent and Standards Interest Group (PSIG) is a forum for W3C Members
and Invited Experts to discuss policy issues regarding the implementation of
the W3C Patent Policy as well as new Patent-related questions that arise
which require action or attention from the W3C Membership. The PSIG has no
authority to create new policy. However, input from the PSIG on the operation
of the policy and areas that might require further policy development by a
W3C Working Group is welcome.
Contact: Rigo Wenning
Policy Languages
The Policy Languages Interest
Group is a forum for W3C Members and non-Members to discuss
interoperability questions that arise when different policy languages are used
in integrated use cases, along with related requirements and needs.
Contacts: Rigo Wenning, Thomas Roessler
Research and Development
The mission of the Research
and Development Interest Group is to increase the incorporation of accessibility considerations into research on Web technologies, and to identify projects researching Web accessibility and suggest research questions that may contribute to new projects.
Contact: Vacant
SVG
The mission of the SVG Interest Group is to foster the widespead discussion of Scalable Vector Graphics as a format and a platform, to gather requirements, and enhance the adoption and usability of SVG in combination with other technologies.
Contact: Doug Schepers
Semantic Web Health Care and Life Sciences
The
mission of the Semantic Web Health Care and Life Sciences Interest Group is to develop, advocate for, and support the use of Semantic Web technologies for health care and life science, with focus on biological science and translational medicine. These domains stand to gain tremendous benefit by adoption of Semantic Web technologies, as they depend on the interoperability of information from many domains and processes for efficient decision support.
Contact: Eric Prud'hommeaux
Semantic Web
The Semantic Web Interest
Group is a forum for W3C Members and non-Members to discuss innovative
Semantic Web applications. The group will focus primarily on applications of
the W3C Semantic Web technologies (RDF,
OWL, SPARQL, etc), on potential
future work items related to technologies, and the relationship of that work
to other activities of W3C and to the broader social and legal context in
which the Web is situated.
Contact: Ivan Herman
WAI
The mission of the Web
Accessibility Initiative Interest Group (WAI IG) is to provide
a forum for review of deliverables under development by other WAI
groups; for exploration of barriers to and potential solutions for
accessibility of the Web; and for exchanging information about
activities related to Web accessibility around the world.
Contact: Judy Brewer
XML Plenary
The XML Plenary Interest Group provides a forum for communication among the members of the Working Groups of the XML Activity, and between the XML Activity and other parts of W3C.
Contact: Liam Quin
XML Schema
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents.
The mission of the XML Schema Working Group is to maintain and enhance the XML Schema Definition Language, an XML vocabulary for defining document classes by specifying structural and non-structural constraints on documents. XML Schema is similar to, but more expressive than, the notation given in XML 1.0 and SGML for document type definitions.
Contact: Henry S. Thompson
Model-based User Interfaces
The mission of the
Model-based
User Interfaces Incubator Group
is to evaluate research on model-based user interface design
as a framework for authoring Web applications and with a view to
proposing work on related standards.
Open Web Education Alliance
The mission of the Open Web Education Alliance Incubator Group is to help
enhance and standardize the architecture of the World Wide Web by facilitating
the highest quality standards and best practice based education for future
generations of Web professionals through such activities as
Provenance
The mission of the Provenance Incubator Group is to provide a state-of-the art understanding and develop a roadmap in the area of provenance for Semantic Web technologies, development, and possible standardization.
Social Web
The mission of the Social Web Incubator Group is to understand the systems and technologies that permit the description and identification of people, groups, organizations, and user-generated content in extensible and privacy-respecting ways.
Hypertext
The
mission of the Hypertext Coordination Group is to
coordinate the work of W3C Working Groups dealing with user-facing technologies, primarily from the Interaction and Ubiquitous Web Domains.
Contact: Chris Lilley
Semantic Web
The Semantic Web Coordination Group is tasked to provide a forum for managing the interrelationships and interdependencies among groups focusing on standards and technologies that relate to the Semantic Web Activity.
Contact: Ivan Herman
WAI
The mission of the WAI Coordination Group (WAI CG) is to
coordinate among all WAI groups, and between WAI groups and other
W3C groups as needed.
Contact: Shadi Abou-Zahra
Web Services
The Web Services Coordination Group provides a forum for coordination for Web services work at W3C, between the Working Groups of the Web Services Activity, the Semantic Web Activity, other parts of W3C, and other organizations.
Contact: Yves Lafon
XML
The XML Coordination Group provides a forum for coordination between the Working Groups of the XML Activity, and between the XML Activity and other parts of W3C, and between the XML Activity and other organizations.
Contact: Liam Quin
About W3C Groups
-
Working Groups
- Working Groups typically produce deliverables
(e.g., standards track technical reports, software,
test suites, and reviews of the deliverables of other
groups).
-
Interest Groups
- The primary goal of an Interest Group is to bring
together people who wish to evaluate potential Web
technologies and policies. An Interest Group is a
forum for the exchange of ideas.
-
Coordination Groups
- A Coordination Group manages dependencies and
facilitates communication with other groups, within
or outside of W3C.
-
Incubator Groups
- Incubator Groups foster rapid development, on a
time scale of a year or less, of new Web-related
concepts. Target concepts include innovative ideas
for specifications, guidelines, and applications that
are not (or not yet) clear candidates for development
and more thorough scrutiny under the current W3C
Recommendation Track.
In addition to these groups, W3C has chartered two
permanent groups:
-
Technical Architecture Group
(TAG)
- W3C created the TAG to document and build
consensus around principles of Web architecture and
to interpret and clarify these principles when
necessary. The TAG also helps to resolve issues
involving general Web architecture brought to the
TAG, and helps coordinate cross-technology
architecture developments inside and outside W3C.
Some TAG Participants are elected by by the W3C
Members, others are appointed by the W3C
Director.
-
Advisory Board (AB)
- The Advisory Board provides ongoing guidance to
the Team on issues of strategy, management, legal
matters, process, and conflict resolution. The
Advisory Board also serves the Members by tracking
issues raised between Advisory Committee meetings,
soliciting Member comments on such issues, and
proposing actions to resolve these issues. The
Advisory Board manages the evolution of the Process Document. AB
Participants are elected by the W3C Members.
Closed Activities and Groups