WCAG 2.0 Comment Submission

Name: Roger Hudson
Email: rhudson@usability.com.au
Affiliation: 
Document: W2
Item Number: Conformance levels and the baseline
Part of Item: 
Comment Type: GE
Comment (Including rationale for any proposed change):
I feel the proposed system of Success Criteria is potentially confusing and misleading. The document states the proposed grouping of success criteria differs in important ways to the approach taken with WCAG 1.0 since in WCAG 1.0 each checkpoint was assigned a “priority” according to its impact on accessibility. While I had some concerns of the allocation of specific levels of priority to checkpoints in WCAG 1.0, I felt the overall priority approach was effective since it was easy to understand and provided clear guidance to website owners and developers



To me the use of phrases like “achieve a minimum level of accessibility” for Level 1 SC and “achieve an enhanced level of accessibility” for Level 2 SC do in effect communicate levels of impact on accessibility. As such they do not seem to be much different to the old “priority” approach.



In practice, web developers and regulatory organizations used the WCAG 1.0 Priority levels as a measure for determining levels of accessibility, and they are likely to continue to do so with WCAG 2.0. 



On a related point, the Note, “For each success criterion, …” is clumsily written. I am not sure what this note is intended to communicate, but I presume it is not supposed to suggest the Working Group will be the body that will determine whether a success criterion has been met. Also, if it is possible to meet a success criterion without passing the tests for all the suggested techniques, or for that matter any of the suggested techniques, then surely some people will wonder why they should consider the suggested techniques at all.



Proposed Change:
Following the principle of “when it is not broke don’t fix it”, I suggest the Working Group consider retaining the “priority” approach, while of course making any necessary adjustments to the priority levels of some criteria.



The note referred to earlier should be either re-written or removed.

Received on Thursday, 11 May 2006 04:27:02 UTC