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Copyright © 2009 W3C® (MIT, ERCIM, Keio), All Rights Reserved. W3C liability, trademark and document use rules apply.
This document describes the requirements for the scope, design, and features of the Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) 1.0. EARL is a vocabulary, the terms of which are defined across a set of specifications and technical notes, and that is used to describe test results. The primary motivation for developing this vocabulary is to facilitate the exchange of test results between Web accessibility evaluation tools in a vendor-neutral and platform-independent format. It also provides reusable terms for generic quality assurance and validation purposes.
The terms of EARL are defined by Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) 1.0 Schema, HTTP Vocabulary in RDF 1.0, Representing Content in RDF 1.0, and Pointer methods in RDF 1.0. A companion document, Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) 1.0 Guide, describes the motivations for EARL and provides an introduction to its uses. An Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) Overview is also available.
This section describes the status of this document at the time of its publication. Other documents may supersede this document. A list of current W3C publications and the latest revision of this technical report can be found in the W3C technical reports index at http://www.w3.org/TR/.
This 29 October 2009 Working Draft of the Requirements for Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) 1.0 is an update of the previous EARL 1.0 Requirements of 11 July 2005 and it incorporates all comments received since the previous Working Draft. In particular, this document now specifies a vocabulary that is defined across a suite of specifications and technical notes rather than only the Evaluation and Report Language 1.0 Schema specification. This document is intended to be published and maintained as a W3C Working Group Note after review and refinement.
The Evaluation and Repair Tools Working Group (ERT WG) encourages feedback about this document, Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) 1.0 Schema, by developers and researchers who have interest in software-supported evaluation and validation of Web sites, and by developers and researchers who have interest in Semantic Web technologies for content description, annotation, and adaptation. In particular, the Working Group is looking for feedback about the consistency, feasibility, and completeness of these requirements, together with how well they might support more generic applications such as Web quality assurance and validation tools.
Please send comments on this Requirements for Evaluation and Report Language (EARL) 1.0 document by 30 November 2009 to public-earl10-comments@w3.org (publicly visible mailing list archive).
Publication as a Working Draft does not imply endorsement by the W3C Membership. This is a draft document and may be updated, replaced or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to cite this document as other than work in progress.
This document has been produced by the Evaluation and Repair Tools Working Group (ERT WG) as part of the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) Technical Activity.
This document was produced by a group operating under the 5 February 2004 W3C Patent Policy. The group does not expect this document to become a W3C Recommendation. W3C maintains a public list of any patent disclosures made in connection with the deliverables of the group; that page also includes instructions for disclosing a patent. An individual who has actual knowledge of a patent which the individual believes contains Essential Claim(s) must disclose the information in accordance with section 6 of the W3C Patent Policy.
On January 1, 2005 and again on ??? 2008, the ERT WG was chartered to continue the development of EARL 1.0. The following is a collection of requirements set forth by the Working Group. Each requirement is labeled with one of the following key words:
Note: These key words, as used in this requirements document, should not be confused with the key words defined by [RFC 2119].