EPUB 3 Working Group A11y Telco — Minutes

Date: 2021-04-08

See also the Agenda and the IRC Log

Attendees

Present: Avneesh Singh, Matthew Chan, Wendy Reid, Ben Schroeter, Gregorio Pellegrino, Matt Garrish, Charles LaPierre, Tzviya Siegman, George Kerscher, Juliette McShane, Cristina Mussinelli

Regrets:

Guests:

Chair: Avneesh Singh

Scribe(s): Matthew Chan

Content:

Avneesh Singh: https://w3c.github.io/epub-specs/epub33/a11y/index.html

1. Source-of example to techniques document

See github issue #1600.

Matt Garrish: just a question going back to 3.1 when we were expecting to drop refines
… up to 3.1 we used to say it was required to put source-of when you had pagelist
… that is gone now
… do we still want to recommend source-of?
… given that there can be multiple dc:source elements in an epub
… the example would mostly be for guidance, an example

Avneesh Singh: so it would not be normative, it would be a technique

Matt Garrish: yes, just a demonstration

Gregorio Pellegrino: i think this requirement is checked by epubcheck or ACE

Matt Garrish: yes, it is required to have dc:source, but not required to have that source identified by this attribute

Avneesh Singh: so, should we include an example of this in the techniques?
… i think there is no harm in it

Charles LaPierre: in GCA we just got a book from WIPO, and they have a dc:source, but they had a refines there pointing to ONIX codelist 5
… instead of pointing to something about pagination

Gregorio Pellegrino: that means that the source code is an ISBN

Charles LaPierre: we’ve been recommending the use of source-of in GCA

Proposed resolution: Add accessibility technique for dc:source metadata. (Avneesh Singh)

Gregorio Pellegrino: +1

Matthew Chan: +1

Charles LaPierre: +1

Wendy Reid: +1

Matt Garrish: +1

Ben Schroeter: +1

George Kerscher: +1

Resolution #1: Add accessibility technique for dc:source metadata.

2. Where is the right place to put the language about RS a11y?

See github issue #1608.

Avneesh Singh: this used to be in the appendix

Matt Garrish: this was considered out of scope for ISO
… they wanted to focus spec on just the content aspect
… so this went into the appendix in a11y 1.0
… question is whether we should be incorporating this into RS spec
… part of the problem is that we can’t tie this to a specific test suite
… there are also questions about CSS overrides, etc. and we can’t really mandate a particular solution
… but we can at least flesh out this recommendation language in the RS spec

Tzviya Siegman: agreed, but I think this is an opportunity for us to work with SILVER

Avneesh Singh: so for our current revision of the spec, are we leaning towards including this sort of language in the RS spec, or keep it in the a11y spec?

Wendy Reid: agree with mgarrish

George Kerscher: including it in RS spec would make it more obvious to RS developers that a11y is important

Proposed resolution: add informative text for reading systems accessibility in the reading systems specifications/guidelines. (Avneesh Singh)

Matt Garrish: +1

Gregorio Pellegrino: +1

Charles LaPierre: +1

Wendy Reid: +1

Ben Schroeter: +1

Matthew Chan: +1

Tzviya Siegman: +1

George Kerscher: +1

Resolution #2: add informative text for reading systems accessibility in the reading

3. dc:source where there is no page source

See github issue #1599.

Matt Garrish: the reason i opened this issue is to deal with dc:source for epub with no print equivalent
… we have a requirement where if you have pagelist then you have to identify source, but when there is no print equivalent there is no source
… so the epub became its own source
… doesn’t really make sense
… so suggest that where there is no print equivalent that we relax this requirement

Ben Schroeter: tie to virtual page numbers, which are often determined by RS, and therefore could not be included in epub metadata when created

Charles LaPierre: that would be if there are no pagebreaks in the epub itself
… if there were already pagebreaks in the digital only epub, then the RS would just use those

Ben Schroeter: but if they’re included in the epub, then they aren’t virtual anymore, right?

Matt Garrish: yeah, this is a source of confusion. What it means for a pagebreak to be “virtual”

Avneesh Singh: CharlesL can you open a new issue to discuss these sorts of use-case issues?

Charles LaPierre: yeah
… so if we’re not going to have dc:source for digital only documents, how are RS to know that pagebreaks exist in the document?
… this is not necessarily an a11y thing
… but the distinction between embedded pagebreaks and pagebreaks created dynamically by RS is still important

George Kerscher: i think RS putting in its own pagebreaks is a really bad idea due to lack of consistency
… having pagebreaks come from publisher is ideal
… but we know that some distributors are planning to put in their own pagebreaks where they don’t already exist because they see the value of it

Ben Schroeter: i don’t think we can make it a requirement, but we can make it a strongly worded best practice

Avneesh Singh: dc:source is not only for print equivalent, it could also be for FXL version, PDF, etc.

Tzviya Siegman: we have digital only pubs, and we included page numbers
… i think we made the dc:source the same as the ISBN of the epub

Avneesh Singh: yes, this was the state of things in a11y 1.0

Tzviya Siegman: and then publishers would decide where to put those digital only pagebreaks in
… and maybe we can just write some best practice about how to do that

George Kerscher: that algorithm is sometimes determined by the authoring tool used by the publisher

Charles LaPierre: to tzviya’s point, I think the whole self-referencing thing was what mgarrish was trying to get away from
… though I liked it

Avneesh Singh: this issue will surface again the virtual locators group

Wendy Reid: https://github.com/w3c/epub-specs/wiki/Use-Cases-for-Virtual-Locators

Wendy Reid: we have a wiki right now where we’re gathering use-cases
… these questions are worth including

George Kerscher: why is self-referential source bad? Maybe we can just clarify in the spec that where there is no print equivalent then the source should just be the epub itself

Avneesh Singh: CharlesL you can open a new issue about these various use-cases

4. Plan for creating EUAA explainer

Cristina Mussinelli: we’ve started working on the document, we’re about half way done at this point
… the first sharable draft should be ready within 10 days or so
… we will share around for review and comment before sending to commission
… the idea is that we will put not only epub, but also metadata
… i.e. ONIX and Schema
… we’re going to give the context that there are already industry wide standards
… and then present the mapping we’ve done between the requirements of the EUAA and the a11y spec
… and that the spec has been created in open process, from non-profit org
… and then similar sections re. metadata
… for metadata we have to explain that the existing format is used throughout the value chain
… and then we can show that required metadata about a11y is included in the prevailing metadata format

Tzviya Siegman: I’d love to help
… Laura Brady and I wrote a small explainer about EUAA, specifically targeted towards a N.American publisher audience

Avneesh Singh: about the mapping document, is it now outdated because our a11y spec has evolved?
… e.g. the EUAA requirement that DRM not block a11y, and the changes our to distribution section

Cristina Mussinelli: we probably won’t put the table into the explainer
… the readers of the explainer will not be technical, so we will describe it

George Kerscher: should table be converted into something in HTML so it is easier to reference?

Gregorio Pellegrino: sure, I can do that and publish it in a repo. Just tell me which one.

Avneesh Singh: sure, I will get back to you

5. AOB

Gregorio Pellegrino: in a11y 1.1 we don’t mention about FXL anywhere. Do you think we have to mention it? Or say there is no solution to have them fully accessible right now?
… the current spec can mislead publisher into thinking that all epubs can be fully accessible right now

George Kerscher: i think we should be careful when it comes to FXL guidance. I’ve read FXLs that have been okay, but I’m not sure what the publisher had to do to get it that way

Avneesh Singh: what gpellegrino is suggesting is more of cautionary language, i think

Wendy Reid: i think it’s worth mentioning in a11y 1.1 that FXL books are different from reflow…
… even though you can apply many of the principles of a11y spec to FXL book and get something very readable
… just highlight that there are special considerations for FXL content

Avneesh Singh: anything else?

George Kerscher: there are videos produced by education and outreach group and they would like to know if publishing is properly represented in their content. They’re looking for a review.
… should I post this to the epub 3.3 list?
… its more of a publishing in general question, although it does involve a11y

Tzviya Siegman: I’ll add it to the steering committee agenda this week
… can you link me to it?

George Kerscher: yes, i’ll dig it out and send it to you

6. Resolutions