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WAI: Strategies, guidelines, resources to make the Web accessible to people with disabilities

Protocols and Formats Working Group (PFWG Public Page

The Protocols and Formats Working Group has closed.

The Protocols and Formats Working Group is no longer chartered to operate. Its work will continue in two new Working Groups:

Resources from the PFWG remain available to support long-term institutional memory, but this information is of historical value only.

Meetings

The PFWG holds face-to-face meetings in various locations as needed. Information about upcoming and past meetings is in the PFWG Meetings page. In the past, PFWG meetings were held in W3C Member space; information about those meetings is available in the PFWG Group Meetings page.

Work

Technical Specifications

Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) 1.1

WAI-ARIA, the Accessible Rich Internet Applications Suite, defines a way to make Web content and Web applications more accessible to people with disabilities. It especially helps with dynamic content and advanced user interface controls developed with Ajax, HTML, JavaScript, and related technologies.

The work has been divided into a series of modules and related documents.  The current editor's working drafts of these are:

Requirements for Accessible Rich Internet Applications 1.1 (public editor's draft)
This roadmap that describes the problem, what W3C specifications will be used to correct the problem, and the timeline for the new specifications. See also the Public Working Draft of the Requirements for Accessible Rich Internet Applications 1.1.
Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) 1.1 (public editor's draft)
This specification provides an ontology of roles, states, and properties that set out an abstract model for accessible interfaces and can be used to improve the accessibility and interoperability of Web Content and Applications. This information can be mapped to accessibility frameworks that use this information to provide alternative access solutions. Similarly, this information can be used to change the rendering of content dynamically using different style sheet properties. The result is an interoperable method for associating behaviors with document-level markup. See also the Public version of WAI-ARIA 1.1.
Core Accessibility API Mappings 1.1 (public editor's draft)
Describes how user agents should map WAI-ARIA features to platform accessibility APIs. Other Accessibility API Mappings specifications depend on and extend this Core specification for specific technologies, including native techology features and WAI-ARIA extensions. See also the Public Working Draft of the Core Accessibility API Mappings.
Accessible Name and Description: Computation and API Mappings 1.1 (public editor's draft)
Describes how user agents determine names and descriptions of accessible objects from web content languages and expose them in accessibility APIs. See also the Public Working Draft of the Accessible Name and Description: Computation and API Mappings 1.1.
HTML Accessibility API Mappings 1.1 (public editor's draft)
This document describes how user agents map HTML5.1 [[!HTML51]] elements and attributes to platform accessibility API roles, states and properties on a variety of platforms, based on the Core Accessibility API Mappings [[!CORE-AAM]] specification for user agents. This document is designed to leverage these core mappings for the HTML5.1 host language.
SVG Accessibility API Mappings 1.1 (public editor's draft)
This document describes how user agents maps SVG2 markup to platform accessibility APIs based on the Core Accessibility API Mappings [CAAM] specification for user agents.
Digital Publishing Accessibility API Mappings 1.1 (public editor's draft)
This document describes how user agents maps digital publishing markup to platform accessibility APIs based on the Core Accessibility API Mappings [CAAM] specification for user agents.
WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices 1.1 (public editor's draft)
Provides recommended approaches to create accessible Web content using WAI-ARIA roles, states, and properties to make widgets, navigation, and behaviors accessible. Also describes considerations that might not be evident to most implementors from the WAI-ARIA specification alone.

Formal Public Working Drafts of these documents can be found from the WAI-ARIA Overview Page.

Editors' sources for the above specifications are maintained in the W3C ARIA GitHub repository. GitHub users can watch this repository and send pull requests.

Media Accessibility User Requirements

Media Accessibility User Requiremenst (public editors' draft) aggregates the requirements of an accessibility user that the W3C HTML5 Accessibility Task Force has collected with respect to audio and video on the Web. See also the Public Working Draft of Media Accessibility User Requirements.

Editors' sources for the above specification is maintained in the W3C PFWG GitHub repository. GitHub users can watch this repository and send pull requests.

Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) 1.0

WAI-ARIA 1.0 has been completed.

The work has been divided into five documents.  The following documents are W3C Recommendations:

Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA)
This specification provides an ontology of roles, states, and properties that set out an abstract model for accessible interfaces and can be used to improve the accessibility and interoperability of Web Content and Applications. This information can be mapped to accessibility frameworks that use this information to provide alternative access solutions. Similarly, this information can be used to change the rendering of content dynamically using different style sheet properties. The result is an interoperable method for associating behaviors with document-level markup.
WAI-ARIA User Agent Implementation Guide
Describes how user agents should map WAI-ARIA features to platform accessibility APIs.

The following documents were developed for WAI-ARIA 1.0 but have not been, and are not expected to be, finalized.

Roadmap for Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA Roadmap)
This roadmap that describes the problem, what W3C specifications will be used to correct the problem, and the timeline for the new specifications.
WAI-ARIA Primer
Explains the accessibility problems posed by hybrid technologies such as DHTML and AJAX and introduces the technologies to map controls, AJAX live regions, and events to accessibility APIs. Also describes new navigation techniques to mark common Web elements such as menus, primary content, secondary content, banner information and other types of Web structures.
WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices
Provides recommended approaches to create accessible Web content using WAI-ARIA roles, states, and properties to make widgets, navigation, and behaviors accessible. Also describes considerations that might not be evident to most implementors from the WAI-ARIA specification alone.

Role Attribute

Role Attribute 1.0 is a W3C Recommendation.

The Role Attribute allows the author to annotate markup languages with machine-extractable semantic information about the purpose of an element. Use cases include accessibility, device adaptation, server-side processing, and complex data description. This attribute can be integrated into any markup language. The role attribute is necessary to support WAI-ARIA to define roles in XML-based languages, when the languages do not define their own role attribute.

Other publications

In addition to the work underway above, the PFWG has been responsible in the past for the incorporation of a number of the accessibility improvements introduced into W3C formats from HTML 4.0 onward including CSS, SMIL, SVG and VoiceXML. Some specific publications developed in service of this work:

Inaccessibility of Visually-Oriented Anti-Robot Tests: Problems and Alternatives
This paper evaluates the accessibility problems with CAPTCHA, a visual verification system popular on many Web sites, and evaluates a number of more-accessible alternatives to the same problems CAPTCHA claims to solve.
Natural Language Usage -- Issues and Strategies for Universal Access to Information
This paper suggests a possible implementation of a language annotation system to clarify meaning in potentially ambiguous terms.
XML Accessibility Guidelines
The discussions for XAG take place on the public wai-xtech list. This specification is developed by the Working Group.
Some of these are are discussed in the following education notes:

About the PFWG

Work of the PFWG is in accordance with the W3C Process. PFWG work is funded in part by the WAI Core project. The work of this group does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the funder.

The charter of the working group outlines the goals, work methods, and requirements for participation. It also explains why the working drafts and email archives of this group are in the members-only area. This activity is conducted by the W3C as part of its Web Accessibility Initiative

Mailing Lists

Patent Disclosures

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.

Janina Sajka <janina@rednote.net> - Chair, PFWG
Michael Cooper <cooper@w3.org> - Staff Contact