Triple-A conformance?

[T.J.]

I am trying to create an accessible page and am trying to
comply to all guidelines.
Are there any other AAA compliancy checkers (apart from
Bobby)

 

[brucie]

I am trying to create an accessible page and am trying to
comply to all guidelines.

it could be argued that if a site claims AAA then it is not designed to
be accessible but rather to comply with the guidelines as some
guidelines hinder accessibility.

so are you designing the site for your visitors or for a set of
guidelines?

which will visit the site more often, humans or a set of guidelines?

Are there any other AAA compliancy checkers (apart from
Bobby)

http://aprompt.snow.utoronto.ca/
http://valet.webthing.com/access/

 

[T.J.]

it could be argued that if a site claims AAA then it is not designed to
be accessible but rather to comply with the guidelines as some
guidelines hinder accessibility.

so are you designing the site for your visitors or for a set of
guidelines?

which will visit the site more often, humans or a set of guidelines?


http://aprompt.snow.utoronto.ca/
http://valet.webthing.com/access/

Thanks for the reply,
That's the problem I am having, I want the page to be usable
and look ok, it looks almost impossible to have a decent page
and have 100 per cent AAA conformity.
I have already used A-Prompt which says the page meets triple-A
approval, and yet it still fails at Bobby.
It passes 508, I think I am going to have to settle on that, without
changing the whole look of the page.
(are you buttons brucie?)

 

[brucie]

That's the problem I am having, I want the page to be usable
and look ok, it looks almost impossible to have a decent page
and have 100 per cent AAA conformity.

this one is "decent" and "looks ok": http://www.kitty5.com/
googling for "Triple-A conformance" (or A,AA) will find others.

I have already used A-Prompt which says the page meets triple-A
approval, and yet it still fails at Bobby.

bobby cant even prase valid html and reports errors where none exist so
don't listen too carefully to it. design for your visitors not to
appease a mindless script.

 

[Nico Schuyt]

T.J. said:

this one is "decent" and "looks ok": http://www.kitty5.com/

Isn't the font-size a bit too small
(view-source:http://www.kitty5.com/inc/css/screen/win/text-n.css)?
Nico

 

[brucie]

Isn't the font-size a bit too small

way too small but at least if you choose to ignore the sizes it isn't an
issue.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

this one is "decent" and "looks ok": http://www.kitty5.com/

Decency is in the eye of the beholder, but since you implicitly claim
that the page is AAA conformant, it needs to be noted that it violates
WAI guidelines in a rather obvious way - though "accessibility
checkers" will miss even such obvious points.

Checkpoint 7.3 says: "Until user agents allow users to freeze moving
content, avoid movement in pages." This alone makes the page lack AAA
conformance, and even AA conformance.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

I have already used A-Prompt which says the page meets triple-A
approval, and yet it still fails at Bobby.

You need to decide what you really want:
(1) A page that is as accessible to anyone as possible.
(2) A page that meets triple-A criteria of WAI guidelines.
(3) A page that is approved at triple-A level by some program.

These are all different things, though not completely unrelated.
Besides, within (3) there is a potentially infinite number of choices.

The short advice is:

Ignore Bobby. Use A-Prompt with discretion and only to the extent that
you understand what it says and how that actually contributes to
helping the disabled and the elderly access your pages. Ditto for WAI
guidelines.

Some longer notes on accessibility checkers:
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www/acctools.html

 

[T.J.]

You need to decide what you really want:
(1) A page that is as accessible to anyone as possible.
(2) A page that meets triple-A criteria of WAI guidelines.
(3) A page that is approved at triple-A level by some program.

These are all different things, though not completely unrelated.
Besides, within (3) there is a potentially infinite number of choices.

The short advice is:

Ignore Bobby. Use A-Prompt with discretion and only to the extent that
you understand what it says and how that actually contributes to
helping the disabled and the elderly access your pages. Ditto for WAI
guidelines.

Some longer notes on accessibility checkers:
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/www/acctools.html

Thank you,
That was the conclusion I was coming to,
use A-Prompt but not be to concerned if the
page fails at Bobby.

 

[brucie]

Decency is in the eye of the beholder, but since you implicitly claim
that the page is AAA conformant, it needs to be noted that it violates
WAI guidelines in a rather obvious way - though "accessibility
checkers" will miss even such obvious points.

Checkpoint 7.3 says: "Until user agents allow users to freeze moving
content, avoid movement in pages." This alone makes the page lack AAA
conformance, and even AA conformance.

i wasn't aware there was any movement on the page. it seems my UA allows
me to freeze moving content.

does "Until user agents" mean every single one used or the majority or
just some? i don't believe much thought was used when whoever it was
thought up the term "until user agents".

you could say selecting the text version of the page allows you to not
only freeze the moving content but completely remove it if your UA
doesn't support freezing moving content.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

Are there any other AAA compliancy checkers (apart from Bobby)

These automated checkers are OK to point out some glaring problems, but to
properly make sure your site complies with any set of accessibility
guidelines, you should print the list of checkpoints off and go through
them with a red pen checking each point and marking it "pass", "fail" or
"not applicable".

Any that you fail, fix, then check everything again from the top.

 

[brucie]

These automated checkers are OK to point out some glaring problems, but to
properly make sure your site complies with any set of accessibility
guidelines, you should print the list of checkpoints off and go through
them with a red pen checking each point and marking it "pass", "fail" or
"not applicable".

Any that you fail, fix, then check everything again from the top.

and then abduct a few people (or 2.99Kg from the local supermarket) with
disabilities to test the site. until it is tested with real live
disabled people you cant claim the site is accessible, just your "best
guess" says it should be.

 

[jake]

and then abduct a few people (or 2.99Kg from the local supermarket) with
disabilities to test the site. until it is tested with real live
disabled people you cant claim the site is accessible, just your "best
guess" says it should be.

But if you can't (e.g. your local by-laws don't allow for abductions),
test the site yourself with a modern/popular screen-reader or voice
browser -- with your screen switched off and using the keyboard for
navigation and input.

Not ideal (as you already know the layout of your site), but not a bad
substitute.

regards.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

does "Until user agents" mean every single one used or the majority
or just some?

"Checkpoints that contain the phrase 'until user agents ..." require
content developers to provide additional support for accessibility
until most user agents readily available to their audience include
the necessary accessibility features."
http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/wai-pageauth.html#until-user-agents

A bit vague. But the problem of interpretation is fairly irrelevant as
long as the dominant browser lacks the necessary features.

i don't believe much thought was used when whoever it
was thought up the term "until user agents".

I would say that there was quite some thought, but it did not culminate
in a crystallized consensus expressed in an accessible language.

you could say selecting the text version of the page allows you to
not only freeze the moving content but completely remove it if your
UA doesn't support freezing moving content.

You could, but that's surely not the idea. Otherwise it would be
irrelevant to have any accessibility requirements concerning images
themselves (as opposite to providing textual alternatives), since you
could always say that you can view the page without images if you
cannot e.g. distinguish red from green.

 

[brucie]

"Checkpoints that contain the phrase 'until user agents ..." require
content developers to provide additional support for accessibility
until most user agents readily available to their audience include
the necessary accessibility features."
http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/wai-pageauth.html#until-user-agents

A bit vague.

its more than a bit. sounds like it was written for a politician.

But the problem of interpretation is fairly irrelevant as
long as the dominant browser lacks the necessary features.

is that the dominant browser over all, the dominant browser in your
stats or the dominant browser for your target audience? how much is
dominant, 60% or maybe 80% to cover for inaccuracies in the stats?

the dominant browser for my site as shown in my stats and therefore
"readily available to their [my] audience" can freeze movable content so
i could claim AAA whereas someone else for the exact same content
couldn't.

You could, but that's surely not the idea.

i believe its a valid option to comply with the guidelines ("require
content developers to provide additional support") the same as supplying
the option of turning css off (removing it) server side if the UA cant
do it to present a plain text version of a site if the visitor wants it.

 

[Jukka K. Korpela]

is that the dominant browser over all, the dominant browser in your
stats or the dominant browser for your target audience?

I meant IE, of course. It has poor or no controls for moving or
flickering content, so the situation is pretty clear. Surely sufficient
browser support would be much more than just the most common browser,
but definitely not less.

how much is
dominant, 60% or maybe 80% to cover for inaccuracies in the stats?

How accessible do you want to be? And statistics are rather irrelevant
here. Accessibility is primarily a minority issue, often dealing with
relatively small minorities (like 0,1 %, which makes only a few million
people). What matters is what those people use for which accessibility
is most crucial. I think we need the W3C WAI group to tell us what the
situation is, before we can regard the "until user agents..." rules as
outdated. They've effectively said that about the rule that tells us to
put nonempty placeholders into text input fields until user agents can
handle empty fields well. (That particular rule was bad from the very
beginning, but I digress.) But not about most other such rules.

the dominant browser for my site as shown in my stats and therefore
"readily available to their [my] audience" can freeze movable
content so i could claim AAA whereas someone else for the exact
same content couldn't.

If you wish to limit the audience to people using some particular
browser, I don't think you are taking the accessibility road.

i believe its a valid option to comply with the guidelines
("require content developers to provide additional support") the
same as supplying the option of turning css off (removing it)
server side if the UA cant do it to present a plain text version of
a site if the visitor wants it.

Sorry, but that does not quite parse. It might help if you could afford
some more capital letters and even some punctuation characters. Anyway,
CSS capabilities sniffing is a rather poor idea, and plain text is even
poorer - contrary to popular belief, plain text versions are generally
_hostile_ to accessibility and usually reflect a complete
misunderstanding of what accessibility is about.

 

[brucie]

Sorry, but that does not quite parse. It might help if you could afford
some more capital letters and even some punctuation characters.

my contract clearly states i do not have to make sense.

Anyway, CSS capabilities sniffing is a rather poor idea,

i wasn't suggesting sniffing. i was suggesting that providing
"additional support for accessibility" such as links which work with any
UA to turn things on and off makes much more sense than avoiding
something "until user agents" which may never occur.

 

[JustAnotherGuy]

in post <T.J. said:




it could be argued that if a site claims AAA then it is not designed to
be accessible but rather to comply with the guidelines as some
guidelines hinder accessibility.

I know the guidelines are rather unusable/draconian for AAA, but how do
they hinder accessibility?

 

[brucie]

in post <JustAnotherGuy said:

[WCAG]

I know the guidelines are rather unusable/draconian for AAA, but how do
they hinder accessibility?

i would like to tell you but it always results in a battle of biblical
proportions and many bloody deaths.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

16/December/2003 04:51:35 pm kilo

Is that a pun on "+1000"?