JB: Len Kasday, who chaired The Evaluation and Repair Tools Working Group and authored WAVE tool, passed away. He has done a lot of good work and will be greatly missed.
HB: He has been a very positive contributor and a bright light. I feel a great loss. He was far too young and he will be missed.
JB: I hope that there will be additional information available. A memorial service will be held next week. There have been a lot of comments online. Comments can be passed on to the family.
JB: Gave a presentation at 3:00 a.m. to teleconference meeting of the W3C offices program. W3C has a number of international offices and does outreach. Often, offices are approached by governments. Need to have a meeting about certain questions that keep coming up. This is related to draft that we will discuss later on.
HB: Last week, he went to Lernout Hauspie Kurzweil group and did a presentation. He talked about user agent guidelines.
CV: Has received several messages about possible adoption of guidelines in Germany. I will send a message to the group about this next week.
AA: Ran two workshops. One was introductory workshop and the second was a more in depth workshop. Had about 30 people at each workshop.
JB: As long as have information sharing meeting and not decision-making meeting and no opposition from others, we can work in Amsterdam on June 22. I will put it out and if I don't hear by Tuesday, I will extend informal invitation to those primarily to those affiliated with EU. This would be a meeting to discuss promotion and adoption of guidelines by those countries involved in the E-Europe initiative. Would anyone be able to attend? Carlos, I know that you can't attend. Is anyone opposed to date and format?
(No one opposed)
JB: You should have had note from Carlos on his last version of corporate implementation plan. This is in an archived message from May 12.
CV: I recorded one comment from Lila.
JB: Consensus? To they have to agree or cooperate?
CV: cooperation
HB: This may be something that departments do not have anything to do with.
JB: expansion
AA: Are there departments that this does not apply to?
HB: This might be the mailroom
AA: This could be part of a larger department.
JB: The next one?
CV: Should I change to cooperation?
JB: yes
CV: The next section, first bullet.
JB: Maybe the two of us could work on the wording offline?
CV: That's fine.
JB: Did you do code changes?
CV: yes
JB: Go to cover page for business case. Go to EOWG home page, you will find link to business case. Instead of burying information, I have started an appendix. Go to appendices cover page. I have added, "Developing a Policy on Web Accessibility." How do you feel about having separate appendix? How about developing separate appendices so that can point people to each piece? The primary pages could be leaner.
AA, SS, HBj, CV: ok
MK: Want to make sure that there is enough information.
AA: I was rereading Australian government policy, and having a document like this, will be very helpful.
JB: Could also link from policy reference page. I've been trying to provide relatively neutral statements, highlight an issue, describe pros and cons, and provide examples.
SS: Provide statement of issue, rationale, and example. What is the issue? Not doing it is the issue?
HBj: Would you make link indicating levels? I like the way the headers read.
JB: If you have comments, go ahead.
AA: Clarify headings a little bit. "Specify a Conformance Level."
JB: If you have other ideas, put on list. Let's look at the content that is covered. Does this cover the biggest issues?
HB: It's an admirable goal, given the way these requirements are evolving. Build this to incorporate unanticipated requirements. Need to work with one stable document. New requirements need to get changed to code.
JB: I need to talk to Wendy. When WCAG 2.0 comes out so that this would be backwards compatible.
HB: Future proofing is a good idea but it may be difficult to implement.
CV: Is it feasible to say target level A and then later on state AA?
AA: One of the difficulties is that there are old documents on a site. May want to say when historical documents can be A level, but after certain date all documents should be AA.
JB: W3C does not have an official position on what policies organizations should develop. Carlos, I want to comment on what you said. The idea on having more than one stage of conformance can be helpful to organizations. As people rework a site, they can incorporate less urgent retrofitting.
MK: Some companies might have contracts with others. It might not be in their contracts. Getting them to use the tools can be a problem.
CV: The way I read this, it sounds that one level is A and another AA.
JB: Make it cleaner? Not so many choices?
CV: The way I read it, it seems like stages.
LC: Could you give several examples?
JB: Should we advise as to what is best organizational fit? Ask them to think about multiple stage or single stage.
HBj: Can these be combined?
JB: I will reflect in change log and new draft. I want to respond to comments by AA and MK. Andrew, when you were saying that the headers should be cleaner. They seem wordy. Marja, the two things that you mentioned are missing: 1. review subcontracts for Web site development; 2. review software used and consider whether it would set a policy on which software is used.
MK: or what contractors use
JB: In U.S. this would be difficult. Usually specify result rather than how it is done.
MK: Even if want to update yourself later on?
HBj: Would you put in company policy that you make it comply to certain guidelines? How to construct would not be a point. We want to have it so that we can update it ourselves.
AA: Only time could be specific is to say we want lotus templates, dreamweaver templates, etc. Really interested in the end result rather than tools.
HBj: I agree
JB: Sounds as if we are saying the same thing.
MK: We have problems because our contractors are using tools that have errors.
JB: Here's another question. It would be easy to expand policy document to encompass everything. Where do we stop? Should we have section that says look at implementation and consider whether policies should include training for new Web masters?
AA: Keep it simple and not reiterate because we have a suite. Some people like to specify assessment tools or evaluation approach. This can cause problems. For example, Australian government only specifies Bobby. Second, prioritizing types of pages such as home pages, navigation pages, disability groups, index pages, summary pages. Index and summary pages might be more important to have accessible than entire document.
HBj: I agree on first part but don't agree on second part. It could be dangerous to say one part of document is accessible and one part is not.
AA: I'm not saying this.
HBj: I don't agree. If want to put document on Web site, entire document should be accessible. This is the wrong message.
AA: I was thinking about retrofitting. I can't fix all pages at once, but can prioritize pages.
SS: I agree with Helle. AA's comment is good. But should not be put out as a policy.
JB: Once one introduces assumptions or priorities, it opens a slippery slope. The assumptions could go astray especially when have inadequate resources.
HB: I like idea of making all abstracts accessible rather than all documents be accessible. Perhaps have a feedback mechanism on the requests.
JB: We may be wandering off scope. Especially in WCAG group, the idea of putting extra attention to summaries is being discussed. The concept of selectivity of what do to some pages is emerging.
JB: Government and other large Web sites are being selective.
HBj: A lot of old document pages are accessible because they are plain html. Each company should have own ideas about priorities. It is dangerous on how to do it.
JB: I am willing to draft a statement that we can discuss. Libby and Jean-Marie, do you have comments?
LC: If we suggest prioritization, does this give them permission?
JB: What if we say new, old, core? Can say be very cautious about making assumptions about what people with disabilities need? What about talking about why segregated Web sites fail?
AA: A lot of people create text-only pages. Do not provide segregated pages. Pages such as text-only pages get out of date and do not have information contained in all pages.
JB: I will try to capture spirit of conversation. Jean-Marie, what do you think?
JD: I will read next version and will comment on it.
JB: Marja, any other comments?
Marja: no
JB: Is anyone planning on sending new pieces before next meeting?
SS: I will do that.
AA: I will work on auxiliary benefits appendix.
HBj: I will work on education and Web developers.
JB: Can you give me your drafts by Tuesday or Wednesday?
HBj: Remember time differences
JB: We will meet on May 25.
Last updated May 25, 2001, by Judy Brewer
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