Judy: I have increasing problems with a new authoring tool; can’t get
the minutes up. I am asking for new authoring software to hopefully
solve the problem. Let’s get started.
Chuck I haven’t got the agenda yet.
Judy My hope was to look at an updated version of the evaluating web sites
document. I have made some progress. But we have acres of edits
to make. It will take some time to get that done. I don’t have
an updated portion to look at today. We may not have a lot of document discussion
today.
Chuck I sent something to the list that hasn’t shown up yet.
Judy I want to see if it is showing up in the archives. Let’s see.
Chuck On June sixth I am presenting in Ottawa about sixty five officers of
government, September 27 Plain language association, how WCAG facilitates
plain language on the web.
Judy Curious what are you going to say? WCAG one or two
Chuck having been somewhat involved in WCAG I can explain some of the intent.
We actually guidelines explaining plain language, the best I can in an hour.
All the elements....
Allen sounds like a lot Chuck.
Judy In the Hawaii conference that testability comes up, questions around
how one can test for plain language.
Chuck I am not talking about that, just trying to help them.
Judy the discussion seems to quickly jump to questions on how to test for
that. Be forewarned.
Chuck I try to not speak about something I know nothing about.
Judy We did get your message in the archives.
Sarah I have two things, one is conference on the ADA issues for libraries
and I was talking about accessibility at that. That was a very interesting
conference. They spent a lot of time talking about libraries access and the
built environment. I use the argument that at the end of the day a lot of
times your virtual library needs as much attention as the physical library
in making it accessible and may be more efficient to make accessible.
Audrey did anyone mention to ALA info on accessibility.
Sarah no
Audrey only voted on a year ago… the blue print for years ahead.
Judy is there a web site at ALA that lists that?
Audrey there is a small section on web accessibility. There is not
a lot to link to right now. It is a long and hard haul.
Judy let us know when you have something to link, and if you have something
in other countries. Question or comments for Sarah? I wanted
to say in terms of the comparative rationales the physical people have complex
process. There is theme that comes up in disability employment issues,
that sounds similar to the library issue, saying that it is so much work
to make work places physically accessible, that telecommuting is a preferable
solution. But people have rights to an accessible physical environment including
in libraries. I would be cautious to emphasize that physical access is also
vital.
Audrey I agree. At the beginning of ADA we focused at the built environment
and we now need to do both. In the library world they are not good
at that, not codified in the built environment. A lot of the architects
know the letter of the law but they don’t understand it. On employment
I am working with ability links. I am advising them about usability;
the interaction between people with disabilities. … One of the major pieces
of this is making their web sites accessible. They thought a year ago
using an old version of bobby and leaving at that was enough.
Judy other questions?
Sarah I have a follow up on that. I think one of the points is that
there are so many services and if we rebuilt the library and a lot of time
spent on planning and to try to get the same seriousness for the web, and
the web can be more plastic and pliable, and the potential and I like to
talk about it in terms of an environment.
Allen I have a friend in library and they have a huge web presence.
They were wedded to some technology like lotus notes. Does not produce
accessible web pages. Can you use something else besides than lotus
notes. We are stuck at that place.
Judy in Canada? They need to be reminded of obligations from the federal
level.
Allen some of the constituencies are doing so.
Sarah I have a second update, last Friday I did this teleconference with
a whole lot of community colleges in California, Holyoke, Stanford....
3 hours long. I think it went well. It is hard to tell when a
lot glitches, I was using a talking desk top. I had to stop switching.
I got some positive feedback. I think it went well. It was certainly
a good way to present to a lot of people.
Judy so does travel. Any other outreach updates? I did a number
of presentations in Honolulu last week. Those included updates on the
web initiative, update of discussion in one session, between accessibility
and metadata. Remind people to use metadata to restrict peoples access
rather than open up access. Partly in response to myths about the role
of accessibility in developing countries, I responded by addressing myths.
Overall an increasing amount of interests in accessibility, and global issues,
some possibilities doing an accessibility track at next year’s conference.
That is in Budapest, …usual form is plenary panels, and breakout panels.
The developer’s day…questions or comments? Any other outreach updates?
Let’s talk about the meeting scheduling topic next. On our meeting
schedule. We had been looking at some dates in early June. We
had decided to forego those dates, because of conflicting related meetings
in DC, and also not enough time to prepare for those meetings. We had
examined some other possibilities of dates. One suggestion to look
for something further out. The early part of the third quarter.
But people also seemed interested in July. I am becoming concerned
whether we can put together some good meetings by then. To have enough
staff to get that done. The 29th and 30th of July. We can talk
about this next week. Any other comments? I am not hearing people
when they come. Could you introduce yourself Charmaine?
Charmaine Corcoran I am from Michigan State University. My background
is …I am web master at Michigan State.
Judy I realize I am not getting a warning beep on the phone line today when
people join. Please introduce yourselves to Charmaine. (Introductions
all around)
Judy let me see then,
Sarah one question where would that meeting be?
Judy more likely Toronto or Ottawa, any comments in late July, let me know,
I would like to re-evaluate next week.
Sarah we have a big echo now.
Judy can we manage...?
[discussion of echoing on line]
Sarah I wanted to say something about the meeting. I wanted to offer
the host a meeting at some point. If that is practical and useful.
Judy at Dartmouth?
Sarah we have pretty good facilities, and I wouldn’t have to travel.
Chuck forgive the ignorance the only Dartmouth I know about is in Canada.
Sarah in Hanover New Hampshire….Boston is two and half hours. We have
a small airport here about fifteen minutes away.
Judy I am wondering Sylvie if you would try calling in again. Any other
comments about 29 and 30th of July. All right lets look at the deliverables
page. Unfortunately Audrey is off the line; wanted to check with her
about training edits.
Allen I didn’t receive links today.
Judy That is true. Ordinarily I send an agenda with links and change
requests. We have been doing extensive amounts of that over the last
two months. I have started making those edits, going slowly, and we
do not have a document to plow through today. Let us look back at the
EO edits page. Just go to the EO main page and look for deliverables;
listen along for now. Maybe next week we can get back to a more normal
mode of operation. Ok so are people on the deliverable page?
Chuck yes.
Judy on the first area the whole timeline needs to be updated. On the
first part what we have across all of those I have started to do that, but
it will take some time. I am not sure it will be ready by next.
If someone is going along with me with those edits, I am not sure on that.
Allen you were talking about helping edit one document.
Allen I was trying to remember that we discussed in LA.
Judy I think it was about how People with Disabilities use the web.
The planning web accessibility training and Audrey had planned to be the
editor for that. That covers about everything in that session.
In the business suite Andrew Arch will be doing those edits. Those
may still be up in the air, because he has been busy with some things.
We need to clear that before we get into the templates and tools documents.
…Allen it is just you and me at this point being editors. Any comments?
Sarah to summarize we have all these documents and assigned editors, nothing
is happening?
Judy Not nothing; on the implementation suite, those edits are in progress.
As of today’s meeting though we don’t have anything fresh to look at.
Not sure it makes sense to keep discussing more documents until we have revisions
to go over.
Sarah are you looking for help? It seems the first quarter priorities have
editors.
Judy Yes I think so but it might be possible to section those out.
I am trying to think about who might be easiest to do that with. On
the evaluating web sites for accessibility…
Chuck I thought we were going to hold off on the checklist if we wanted to
make any deadlines.
Judy I don’t know about any of the web sites ones, Sarah I will look for
some sections to do and contact you. Any one else interested at editing?
Charmaine yes.
Judy it may be hard to do when just joining, without the context of the discussions.
Chuck these edits are supported by the discussions in the change log.
Judy the edits are supported with varying degrees of accuracy in the change
log.
Chuck I will volunteer for something as long as before the end of June.
I will be out of the work place in July.
Judy so I think what we are in today is a simple bottleneck, if we can just
get a few pieces in place, we can be ready for next Friday. Unless
anyone has something else to say about the status of these, I will call both
Audrey, and Andrew to check in about the plans for editing.
Chuck I trust you will assign something for me to do.
Judy for Sarah, Chuck, I am wondering about switching to an editors meeting
at this point. Maybe Allen also could stay to help plan on how to divide
the editing work.
Chuck giving half of the group permission to leave early?
Judy yes, more than half. Does anyone object to proceeding in that
way with our remaining time? It would be primarily between Sarah, Chuck,
and possibly Allen.
Allen would be important to retrieve the document?
Judy if you have a single line, don't worry for now, stay for discussion.
Any protest at proceeding with an editors' meeting?
Charmaine I wanted to hang in there for the meeting and learn more.
Sylvie I wanted to ask if I can help too on some of these things. This
is editing html documents?
Judy I am trying to get more people involved in these edits. You are
welcome to stay. Henk did you want to stay or go.
Henk I will stay.
[Regular meeting adjourns; editors meeting follows]
Last revised May 24, 2002 by Judy Brewer