WCAG, ACT, and WAI-ARIA

WCAG, ACT, and WAI-ARIA

17 October 2017
Shadi Abou-Zahra
W3C Accessibility Strategy and Technology Specialist
shadi@w3.org

World Wide Web Consortium

"Leading the Web to its full potential"

• International, vendor-neutral consortium
• Multi-stakeholder, consensus process
• Open and royalty-free web standards:
  • HTML, CSS, XML, SVG, SMIL, ...
• Hosted by MIT, ERCIM, Keio, and Beihang

Web Accessibility

WCAG 2.0

Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0:

• Published by W3C in December 2008
• Adopted in Japan as JIS 8341 in 2010
• Adopted by ISO/IEC as 40500 in 2012
• Included in EN 301 549 v1.1.2 in 2014
• Referenced by US Section 508 in 2017

WCAG Documents

WCAG Quick Reference

w3.org/WAI/WCAG20/quickref/

Open Web Platform

WCAG 2.1

Fully backward compatible with WCAG 2.0, with improvements on:

• People with low vision
• People with cognitive and learning disabilities
• Mobile accessibility

WCAG 2.1 Timeline

Work on WCAG 2.1 officially started in January 2017:

• First Public Working Draft on 28 February 2017
• Updated drafts in April, June, July, and August
• Latest Working Draft published 12 September
• Stable Working Draft scheduled for November
• Candidate Recommendation in January 2018
• Proposed Recommendation in April/May 2018
• W3C Recommendation expected in June 2018

WCAG 2.1 Proposals

7 proposed new Success Criteria for Perceivable:

• Purpose of controls (1.3.4, AA)
• Contextual Information (1.3.5, AAA)
• Zoom Content (1.4.10, AA)
• Graphics Contrast (1.4.11, AA)
• User Interface Component Contrast (Minimum) (1.4.12, AA)
• Adapting Text (1.4.13, AA)
• Content on Hover or Focus (1.4.14, AA)

WCAG 2.1 Proposals

12 proposed new Success Criteria for Operable:

• Accessible Authentication (2.2.6, A)
• Interruptions (2.2.7, AA)
• Timeouts (2.2.8, AAA)
• Animation from Interactions (2.2.9, AAA)
• Character Key Shortcuts (2.4.11, A)
• Accessible Name (2.4.12, A)
• [...]

WCAG 2.1 Proposals

12 proposed new Success Criteria for Operable:

• [...]
• Pointer Gestures (2.5.1, A)
• Concurrent Input (2.5.2, AA)
• Target Size (2.5.3, AA)
• Target Size (no exemption) (2.5.4, AAA)
• Device Sensors (2.6.1, A)
• Orientation (2.6.2, AA)

WCAG 2.1 Proposals

2 proposed new Success Criteria for Understandable:

• Accidental Activation (3.2.6, A)
• Change of Content (3.2.7, AA)

Get Involved

You can contribute to completion of WCAG 2.1:

• Feedback comments on working drafts
• Development of WCAG 2.1 Techniques
• Implementation testing of WCAG 2.1

WCAG ACT

WCAG Accessibility Conformance Testing (ACT):

• Work on AERT and EARL dated to 1999
• EC-funded WAB-Cluster projects in 2005
• auto-WCAG Community Group in ~2015
• Launch of W3C ACT Task Force in 2017

WCAG ACT Approach

Open collaboration to build on existing efforts:

• Contribution of test rules from different sources
• Community-based cross-review and validation
• Take-up by vendors in tools and methodologies

ACT TF Scope

Automated, semi-automated, and manual tesing:

• ACT Rules Format, a W3C standard
• ACT Rules, repository of open tests
• Test cases and implementation data

Who's Involved?

Accessibility Foundation, BBC, Daisy, Deque, Difi, IBM, Interactive Accessibility, Knowbility, Siteimprove, SSB Bart, Tingtun, Urbilog, ...

ACT Rules

w3c.github.io/wcag-act-rules/

Get Involved

Participation welcome in auto-WCAG and ACT TF:

• Feedback and comments on working drafts
• Development and implementation of rules
• Collection of test cases for rule verification

WAI-ARIA

Accessible Rich Internet Applications (ARIA):

• Started in 2006 to address "DHTML"
• Adoption into HTML5 is on-going
• Adoption into SVG and e-publishing

WAI-ARIA 1.1

Currently W3C Candidate Recommendation:

• New table, row, and column properties
• Feed, Figure, Searchbox, Switch, Term
• New states and properties (eg. "current")
• Updated "accessible name calculation"
• Various clean-ups and clarifications

WAI-ARIA Mappings

Implementation of WAI-ARIA on various platforms:

• Adoption of ARIA in HTML
• WAI-ARIA Core Mapping
• WAI-ARIA Dpub Mapping
• WAI-ARIA SVG Mapping
• WAI-ARIA Graphics Mapping

Get Involved

Contribution invited to promoting implementation of WAI-ARIA:

• Testing of browsers and assistive technology
• Mappings to HTML, Dpub, SVG, and other specs
• Feature requirements for future developments

Thank You

17 October 2017
Shadi Abou-Zahra
W3C Accessibility Strategy and Technology Specialist
shadi@w3.org