Protocols and Formats Working Group Charter

The Protocols and Formats Working Group is now closed. It has been replaced by the Accessible Platform Architectures and Accessible Rich Internet Applications Working Groups.

The mission of the Protocols and Formats Working Group (PFWG), part of the WAI Technical Activity, is to ensure W3C specifications provide support for accessibility to people with disabilities. The group advances this mission through review of W3C specifications, technical support materials, and specifications that bridge known gaps.

This mission is complementary to the work of other Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) groups within the WAI Technical Activity and the WAI International Program Office Activity. The PFWG is part of the WAI Technical Activity.

End date	8 October 2015
Confidentiality	The group operates in Member-only space but conducts some activities in public.
Initial Chairs	Janina Sajka
Initial Team Contacts (FTE %: 45)	Michael Cooper
Usual Meeting Schedule	Teleconferences: Weekly Face-to-face: approximately 2 per year

Scope

On behalf of other WAI groups, provide expertise to the W3C about the needs of users with disabilities. This includes both serving as a passive resource base and providing active educational inreach to the W3C community as needed.
Review W3C specifications as needed, particularly at the First Public Working Draft and Last Call stages, to identify accessibility issues and make recommendations to the appropriate Working Group.
Work closely with Working Groups when needed to help them architect their specifications to support, and not unknowingly interfere with, accessibility.
Advocate in W3C coordination activities for the creation and reuse of common approaches to implementing functions that access depends on. Note that WAI-ARIA is intended to be a bridging technology. It is expected that, over time, host languages will evolve to provide semantics for objects that currently can only be declared with WAI-ARIA.
Collect information about technology features, implementation, and usage patterns to institutionalize W3C knowledge about present-day accessibility problems.
Review non-W3C technologies that impact the accessibility of W3C technologies. Strategize solutions within W3C and via liaisons with external organizations.
Create technology extensions to address accessibility issues in already deployed technologies.

Success Criteria

Other W3C specifications have improved accessibility.
Release of WAI-ARIA as a W3C Recommendation.
Release of WAI-ARIA Implementation Guide as a W3C Recommendation.
Release of HTML 5 Accessiblity API Guide as a W3C Recommendation.
Release of Role Attribute as a W3C Recommendation.
Demonstrate successful implementation of WAI-ARIA and the improved accessibility of RIch Web (Web 2.0) content in a broad range of user agents.

Out of Scope

Education and evangelization outside of the W3C.

Deliverables

The following deliverables would be published as W3C Technical Reports:

Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) Version 1.0 (Recommendation)
WAI-ARIA Implementation Guide (Recommendation)
HTML 5 Accessibility API Guide (Recommendation)
Role Attribute Module (Recommendation)
WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices (Note)
WAI-ARIA Primer (Note)
Roadmap for Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA Roadmap) (Note)
Inaccessibility of CAPTCHA (Note)
Requirements for ARIA 2.0 (Note)
Working Group notes to formalize accessibility knowledge on specific topics as the need arises (Note)

Other Deliverables

Feedback to W3C specification developers
WAI-ARIA samples
WAI-ARIA test suite, acid tests
Accessibility API to ARIA binding information (UA developers lead?)

Milestones

Milestones
Specification	FPWD	LC	CR	PR	Rec
Note: The group will document significant changes from this initial schedule on the group home page.
WAI-ARIA 1.0		July 2010	Sept 2010	Jan 2011	Mar 2011
WAI-ARIA 1.0 User Agent Implementation Guide		Sept 2010	Jan 2011	Jan 2011	Mar 2011
Role Attribute	July 2010	Sep 2010	Nov 2010	Dec 2010	Jan 2011
HTML Accessibility API Guide	July 2010	Jan 2011	Mar 2011	Jan 2012	Mar 2012

Timeline View Summary

Q3 2010: Second Last Call Working Draft of WAI-ARIA
First Public Working Draft of Role Attribute
Last Call Working Draft of Role Attribute (document inherited from XHTML 2 and nearly complete so ready for rapid advancement)
Public Working Draft (on Rec track) of WAI-ARIA User Agent Implementation Guide
Public Working Draft of WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices
Public Working Draft of WAI-ARIA Roadmap
Process public comments on WAI-ARIA Second Last Call, WAI-ARIA User Agent Implementation Guide, WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices, WAI-ARIA Roadmap, Role Attribute
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q4 2010: Candidate Recommentation of WAI-ARIA
Candidate Recommendation of Role Attribute
Last Call Working Draft of WAI-ARIA User Agent Implementation Guide
First Public Working Draft of HTML Accessibility API Guide
Public Working Draft of WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices
Proposed Recommendation of Role Attribute (small module, implementation testing is trivial)
Call for Implementations of WAI-ARIA
Collect and evaluate implementations of WAI-ARIA
Work with WAI-ARIA implementers to address interoperability issues
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q1 2011: WAI-ARIA Implementation Report
Last Call Working Draft of HTML Accessibility API Guide
Candidate Recommendation of WAI-ARIA Implementation Guide
Proposed Recommendation of WAI-ARIA Implementation Guide (advanced quickly because testing done as part of the ARIA CR process)
Proposed Recommendation Working Draft of WAI-ARIA
Role Attribute becomes W3C Recommendation
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q2 2011: Candidate Recommendation of HTML Accessibility API Guide
WAI-ARIA becomes W3C Recommendation
WAI-ARIA User Agent Implementation Guide becomes W3C Recommendation
WAI-ARIA Authoring Practices becomes Working Group Note
WAI-ARIA Primer becomes Working Group Note
WAI-ARIA Roadmap becomes Working Group Note
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q3 2011: Requirements for future versions of WAI-ARIA
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q4 2011: Updated Inaccessibility of CAPTCHA Working Group Note
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q1 2012: HTML Accessibility API Implementation Report
Proposed Recommendation of HTML Accessibility API Guide
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q2 2012: HTML Accessibility API Guide becomes W3C Recommendation
Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q3 2012: Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q4 2012: Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q1 2013: Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed
Q2 2013: Publish topical accessibility guidance as needed
Support implementation of WAI-ARIA 1.0
Review W3C Working Drafts as needed
Coordinate accessibility issues with Working Groups as needed

Dependencies

W3C Groups

Ubiquitous Web Activity: Representation of the accessibility aspect of device independence
Internationalization Activity: Coordinate how to address accessibility and internationalization in W3C specs
Hypertext Coordination Group: Coordination on accessibility of browser-oriented specifications
HTML WG: Implementation of ARIA
SVG WG: Implementation of ARIA, review of the Role attribute
WAI Coordination Group: Coordinating the roles of the WAI Working Groups when issues relevant to the PFWG mission are found

Furthermore, Protocols and Formats Working Group expects to follow these W3C Recommendations:

External Groups

none

Participation

To be successful, the Protocols and Formats Working Group is expected to have 10 or more active participants for its duration, with participation where possible including representation from industry, disability communities, accessibility research and government. Effective participation to Protocols and Formats Working Group is expected to consume four to eight hours per week for each participant; twice as much per week for chairs and editors. The Protocols and Formats Working Group will allocate also the necessary resources for building Test Suites for each specification.

Participants are reminded of the Good Standing requirements of the W3C Process.

Communication

The work of the Working Group primarily takes place on weekly teleconferences. This group uses the Member-only mailing list w3c-wai-pf@w3.org (archive) for topical discussion between meetings. Discussions that are relevant to the PFWG scope and do not depend on W3C Member Confidential sources should be addressed to the publicly archived mailing list with email address wai-xtech@w3.org. Comments on PFWG Technical Reports may be sent to public-pfwg-comments@w3.org (archive).

Information about the group (deliverables, participants, face-to-face meetings, teleconferences, etc.) is available from the WAI home page as well as the Protocols and Formats Working Group home page.

Decision Policy

As explained in the Process Document (section 3.3), this group will seek to make decisions when there is consensus. When the Chair puts a question and observes dissent, after due consideration of different opinions, the Chair should record a decision (possibly after a formal vote) and any objections, and move on.

When deciding a substantive technical issue, the Chair may put a question before the group. When the Chair conducts a formal vote to reach a decision on a substantive technical issue, eligible voters may vote on a proposal one of three ways: for a proposal, against a proposal, or abstain. For the proposal to pass there must be more votes for the proposal than against. In case of a tie, the Chair will decide the outcome of the proposal.

This charter is written in accordance with Section 3.4, Votes of the W3C Process Document and includes no voting procedures beyond what the Process Document requires.

Patent Policy

This Working Group operates under the W3C Patent Policy (5 February 2004 Version). To promote the widest adoption of Web standards, W3C seeks to issue Recommendations that can be implemented, according to this policy, on a Royalty-Free basis.

For more information about disclosure obligations for this group, please see the W3C Patent Policy Implementation.

About this Charter

This charter for the Protocols and Formats Working Group has been created according to section 6.2 of the Process Document. In the event of a conflict between this document or the provisions of any charter and the W3C Process, the W3C Process shall take precedence.

In July 2013, this charter was extended to 30 September 2013. In February 2015, this charter was extended to 18 May 2015. In May 2015, this charter was extended to 15 July 2015. In July 2015, this charter was extended to 13 August 2015. In August 2015, this charter was extended to 8 October 2015.

Please also see the previous charter for this group.

Michael Cooper, PFWG Team Contact
Janina Sajka, PFWG Chair

$Date: 2017/08/11 18:16:14 $