Edit comment LC-1180 for Accessibility Guidelines Working Group

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Comment LC-1180: Comment Shortname:; Commenter: Greg Lowney <gcl-0039@access-research.org> on behalf of Lowney Access Research, LLC; Message-id:; Section of the document concerned:

or; Refinement of the section concerned:; Status:
assigned to; Type:; Resolution status:
Response drafted Resolution implemented Reply sent to commenter; Response status:
No response from Commenter yet Commenter approved disposition Commenter objected to disposition
Commenter's response (URI):; Comment:
Definition of CONTENT currently reads ""information to be communicated to the user by means of a user agent"" and has a Note which reads ""This includes the code and markup that define the structure, presentation, and interaction, as well as text, images, and sounds that convey information to the end-user."".

Content is defined as being limited to ""information"", but the definition of ""information"" seems to exclude purely decorative elements and elements who purpose is to create a specific sensory experience; both of those are distinguished from informational content in the document, but seem to clearly be part of the content. That should be acknowledged here.

(Content also include controls whose purpose is to gather input from the user, but I guess we don't need to call those out since they must also have some presentation.)

Similarly, the Note seemt to say that scripts included in a Web page are part of the content, but these don't fit into the definition of ""information"" as they might respond to user input or other triggers, without having any presentation of their own. Thus, the Note seems to contradict the definitions themselves.

It is unfortunate that the document defines ""information"", ""purely decorative elements"", and content ""designed to create a specific sensory experience"" as mutually exclusive, with no term that currently includes them all. I believe that ""content"" should be that term, but it would require broadening the definition of ""content"" beyond just ""information"" or broadening the definition of ""information"".

Proposed Change:

Change to "information and decorative or sensory elements to be communicated to the user by means of a user agent, as well as code or markup that define the stucture, presentation, and interactions associated with those elements".; Related issues: (space separated ids); WG Notes: [EDITORZ] Discussed in the 13 July 2006 telecon: resolution: accept LC-1180 http://www.w3.org/2006/07/13-wai-wcag-minutes.html {parital - accept} DONE - update definition of content to read: information and sensory experience to be communicated to the user by means of a user agent, as well as code or markup that define the structure, presentation, and interactions associated with those elements Response: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-comments-wcag20/2007Jun/0300.html; Resolution: We have updated the definition, but have used slightly different wording. The definition now reads, "information and sensory experience to be communicated to the user by means of a user agent, as well as code or markup that define the structure, presentation, and interactions associated with those elements"; (Please make sure the resolution is adapted for public consumption)