Edit comment LC-737 for Accessibility Guidelines Working Group

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Comment LC-737: Comment Shortname:; Commenter: Rick Hill <rrhill@ucdavis.edu>; 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:
Part of Item:
Comment Type: GE
Comment (including rationale for proposed change):

I for one do not have the time to read all of the WCAG 2 documents in
the 30-day review time-frame that has been provided. Having read Joe
Clark\'s comments at http://www.alistapart.com/articles/
tohellwithwcag2 and http://joeclark.org/access/webaccess/WCAG/ as
well as postings at http://technorati.com/tag/WCAG2. If only 10% of
the issues that are identified on these sites are true, then WCAG 2
is NOT ready for prime time. If it is true that web pages that meet
WCAG 2 need not be valid HTML/XHTML then that is utterly contrary to
the concept of web standards and is a HUGE step in the wrong
direction. I would hope that the WCAG 2 standards build on and
enhance the standards of WCAG 1 that many of us have worked hard to
promote in our work places. Other comments:

1. The provision to define a technology as a â€œbaseline,â€? is not
useful unless there is either some way to make sure that the
technology is inherently accessible and/or that there are provisions
to provide alternate technologies to provide accessible versions of
the content where the baseline technology fails.

2. Being able to define entire directories of your site as off-limits
to accessibility should only be allowed when the content cannot be
made accessible.

3. The compliance \"levels\" do not seem to have become simpler.
Perhaps more cryptic. And I would like to see a move toward
enforcible standrads rather than merely guidelines (as in what was
attempted with the language of 508).

4. You canâ€™t use offscreen positioning to add labels (e.g., to forms)
that only some people, like users of assistive technology, can
perceive. Everybody has to see them.

5. Source order must match presentation order even at the lowest
level ... why?

6. It would seem that WCAG 2 proposes maintaining separate accessible
and inaccessible versions of the same pages.

Again, I wish I had the time to drop my day-to-day tasks, stop
pushing for web standard design in our environment (including
accessible design) and devote my time to being able to read an
comment on the final WCAG 2 draft. However, the comments from folks
in the know and in the filed have not been encouraging. So, I
decided to drop a line and express my concerns and fears. SInce it
took years for the committee to reach this point, it would seem a
slightly longer review period to allow comment is in order. And one
would hope, if the public (those folks working to promote accessible
design) have real concerns about the standard, then the committee
needs to regroup and address those concerns, not publish a set of
guidelines that will not be accepted or used in practice ...

Proposed Change:; Related issues: 829, thru, 834 4.1.1
(space separated ids); WG Notes: [EDITORZ] [HOLD] The numbered items in this comment were broken out into separate items. (LC-829 through LC-834). BBC: 27 March - All issues except 830 have been closed LGR: 05 April - 830 closed {partial accept}; Resolution: (thank you etc) Extensive changes have been made in response to the comments received on the last draft of the guidelines. {insert text regarding validity here} ### include replies from issues 829-834 here; (Please make sure the resolution is adapted for public consumption)