Edit comment LC-1322 for Accessibility Guidelines Working Group

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Comment LC-1322: Comment Shortname:; Commenter: Takayuki Watanabe, Makoto Ueki, and Masahiro Umegaki <nabe@lab.twcu.ac.jp> on behalf of JIS WG2; Message-id:; Section of the document concerned:

or; Refinement of the section concerned:; Status:
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Comment: JIS X 8341-3 also addresses the importance of volume control. It allows the users who are hard of hearing to adjust the volume of the audio. Is it unnecessary for WCAG 2.0 to require the mechanism of the audio volume control?

JIS 5.7 b) says:
<quote>
b) Sound should be controllable by users.

Information:
Hearing impaired users cannot detect that sound is being played. Also, there are cases where louder volume is preferred.

Example:
To enable users to adjust volume, play, and stop, provides controls for play, stop, and volume adjustment. When using plugins, they can be used for this purpose
</quote>; Related issues: (space separated ids); WG Notes: [TEAMA] @@add advisory technique ""provide volume adjustment capabilities to audio that plays in a custom application that is part of the content." There are several distinctive issues abut this. I think the comment is asking for the user to be able to adjust overall volume. The SC is about audio contrast (forground vs background). So if we did add a SC for volume it would not be here. If we want to to require a separate volume for foreground it is would be almost impossible to meet. 1) Overall Audio Volume gain. Audio volume is generally a User Agent issue. In the case of an embedded web application it could be included. Generally the volume is controlled by an amplifier that the user has at their end. If they are hard of hearing they would presumably have an amplifier that would give them sufficient volume gain. Almost all sound content uses commercial players, which have volume controls. The only case I can think of where this is an issue might be a custom application. In 10 years on the web I've never seen a custom audio application for the web. However, I see no major problem with adding an advisory technique that says: "provide volume adjustment capabilities to audio that plays in a custom application that is part of the content." Discussed in the 20 July 2006 telecon: Resolution: accept LC-1322 as proposed http://www.w3.org/2006/07/20-wai-wcag-minutes.html; Resolution: Control of volume is a user agent issue. Most players already have volume controls on them. Content, due to security issues, usually cannot directly access the hardware volume control and thus can only turn volume down not up. We therefore do not include a recommendation for content to also include a volume control, though user agents should. This belongs to the domain of User Agents and is covered in the User Agent guidelines (UAAG 1.0) which reads as follows: "Guideline 4. Ensure user control of rendering...User agents rendering audio have to allow the user to control the audio volume globally and to allow the user to control distinguishable audio tracks."; (Please make sure the resolution is adapted for public consumption)