IT Accessibility Committee February 2008 Newsletter

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February 2008 Newsletter

### Edited by Joel Obuchowski

Articles and ideas for future newsletters? Please e-mail them to Debi Orton dorton@goer.state.ny.us and Joel Obuchowski jobuchow@ins.state.ny.us

NEXT COMMITTEE MEETING

When: Thursday, 2/14/08, from 2:30 - 4:00

Where: Forum Offices, 411 State Street, Albany

We'll update our progress on the Validation Tool project, and where we are with license distribution and training. In addition, we'll discuss plans for two upcoming presentations, and we'll be looking for volunteers to help.

As many of you may be aware, our Policy and Standards are due for review this year, and we're looking to those of you developing State agency web sites to let us know what changes you think should be made in both documents. We encourage you to attend the February Committee meeting, live or via conference call, or if you are unable to attend, forward your requests and rationale to either Mike Short (mike.short@cs.state.ny.us) or Debi Orton (dorton@goer.state.ny.us).

NOTE: If you'd like to use the conference call option, please let Debi know as soon as possible so that arrangements can be made.

Map and Directions? Location link (via Mapquest.com):
http://www.mapquest.com/maps/map.adp?searchtype=address&country=US&addtohistory=&searchtab=home&formtype=address&popflag=0&latitude=&longitude=&name=&phone=&level=&cat=&address=411+State+Street&city=Albany&state=ny&zipcode= (External Link)

UPCOMING EVENTS

SAVE THE DATE!

Governor's Assistive Technology Expo - 10th Anniversary!

Lieutenant Governor David A. Patterson, a nationally-recognized advocate for persons with visual and physical impairments, will be welcoming attendees at TECHNOLOGY OPENS DOORS, The New York State Governor's Expo on Assistive Technology, to be held on Thursday, May 15, 2008 at the Empire State Plaza Convention Center in Albany, New York.

At the Expo, hundreds of exhibits and workshops on assistive devices and services will be showcased. In addition, the NYS Forum's award-winning IT Accessibility Committee will present a series of tutorials on all aspects of accessible website development.

We hope that you will join us for this exciting opportunity, which has been a biennial event since 1998, when it was first sponsored by the New York State Interagency Partnership on Assistive Technology and its Advisory Board. Based on past Expo attendance, up to 1000 participants are expected, so we urge you to register soon.

For registration information go to:: www.ATEXPO2008.com; Or Call; Michelle Murray; NYS Commission on Quality of Care and Advocacy for Persons with Disabilities (CQCAPD); (800) 522-4369 (NYS only Voice/TTY/Spanish) or (518) 388-0690

"Introduction to Web Accessibility" To Be Offered

On Wednesday, March 26, the NYS Forum IT Accessibility Committee will present a half-day "Introduction to Web Accessibility," to be held in the Empire State Plaza meeting facility. This class would be useful to anyone wanting a general grasp of what web accessibility is and some of the ways in which web accessibility can be achieved.

The program will touch on the following topics:: Background in Policy and Law; Eating the Elephant - Tackle the simple fixes first; Making Images and Other Visual Elements Accessible; Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) - Separating presentation and content; Tables and Forms; Testing Your Content for Accessibility

Registration will be required and will be announced on this listserv when available.

FEATURE ARTICLE

WAI Outreach Director Presents at SUNY

On Monday January 28 Shawn Henry, Outreach Director for the W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) delivered a presentation entitled "Making the Web Accessible to All" as part of the College of Computing and Information Women in Technology lecture series.

Assistant Dean Jennifer Goodall said in her introduction that she had taught web development for years and told people that if they were interested in accessibility they'd have to get that information elsewhere, because she didn't consider it terribly important. At a conference she attended, one of the programs was Ms. Henry discussing web accessibility. Ms. Goodall said that it had forever changed her opinion of the importance of accessibility.

Ms. Henry opened her presentation by focusing on three people she knew personally. The first, John, became blind in young adulthood, and navigated the web by using a screen reader. He had recently discovered he had leukemia, but ran into trouble, because all of the leukemia organizations he turned to for information had inaccessible web sites.

The second person she introduced was also named John, but was blind from birth and had also lost his hearing. Because John was also deaf, his interface with the web was a refreshable Braille display. Many in the audience had never seen a Braille display, and Ms. Henry fielded several questions about how the device operated.

The third person Ms. Henry used as an example was a man who had lost the use of his arms to polio. With the aid of a mouth stick, the man was able to type out what he needed. Ms. Henry went on to cover the increasing incidence of disability in an aging population, a demonstration we often use in our presentations, to make the point that even if you aren't disabled today, you may be disabled a few years from now.

She also reminded the audience that the efforts you make to develop an accessible site pay dividends in improving your site's performance for all, including those using mobile devices, and those using older technology or slower connections.

Ms. Henry went on to show a YouTube video of a woman named Glenda who had cerebral palsy. Glenda could only type using her right thumb, and even then, only if she braced the rest of her left hand against the top of the keyboard. Glenda had written an entire book that way.

The web facilitates interaction with the real world for persons with disabilities, Ms. Henry declared, and went on to cover some of the more technical aspects of web development, such as the difference in clarity between an improperly marked up page and one that had been marked up semantically.

Ms. Henry finished up by taking the audience on a tour of the resources available on the WAI's web site. She discussed the protracted "working draft" status of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) version 2.0 and promised that they would be released by mid-summer.

She took quite a few questions from the audience, including what alternatives might be available given the direction being taken by the HTML 5 workgroup to eliminate a lot of the attributes used to implement increased accessibility. She pointed out that the work involved in moving to HTML 5 was going to take years, and she was sure that some sort of accommodation would be made by then.

She was also asked about the progress being made by the WAI-ARIA workgroup, and she said that she expected a set of best practice guidelines would be available within the first few weeks of February.

Ms. Henry stayed well beyond the end of the session to take more questions from the audience, and the other attendees I spoke with -- including several committee members -- seemed to find the presentation worthwhile and informative.

RECENT NEWS

"Amazon.com" Accessibility to be completed June 30, 2008"

http://www.nfb.org/nfb/NewsBot.asp?MODE=VIEW&ID=266&SnID=747376771 (External Link)

W3C Activity

W3C Publishes HTML 5 Draft, Future of Web Content

2008-01-22: W3C today published an early draft of HTML 5, a major revision of the markup language for the Web. The HTML Working Group is creating HTML 5 to be the open, royalty-free specification for rich Web content and Web applications. "HTML is of course a very important standard," said Tim Berners-Lee, author of the first version of HTML and W3C Director. "I am glad to see that the community of developers, including browser vendors, is working together to create the best possible path for the Web." New features include APIs for drawing two-dimensional graphics and ways to embed and control audio and video content. HTML 5 helps to improve interoperability and reduce software costs by giving precise rules not only about how to handle all correct HTML documents but also how to recover from errors. Read a summary of the differences between HTML 4 and HTML 5 at: http://www.w3.org/TR/2008/WD-html5-diff-20080122/ (External Link) .

This is only the first draft of the HTML5 specification. The final working draft is not scheduled to be developed until mid-2009.

WAI-ARIA for Accessible Rich Web Applications: First Public Working Drafts

2008-02-04: The Protocols and Formats Working Group published First Public Working Drafts of:: Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) Version 1.0 combines the two previously-published ARIA draft specifications: WAI-ARIA Roles, and WAI-ARIA States and Properties.; WAI-ARIA Primer provides background on accessibility issues related to JavaScript, and introduces the technical approach used in WAI-ARIA.; WAI-ARIA Best Practices describes how Web content developers can develop accessible rich Web applications using WAI-ARIA.

WAI-ARIA defines a way to make Web content and Web applications more accessible to people with disabilities. It especially helps with dynamic content and advanced user interface controls developed with Ajax, HTML, JavaScript, and related technologies. An updated WAI-ARIA Roadmap was also published.

Additionally, the Education and Outreach Working Group published a new WAI-ARIA FAQ and updated WAI-ARIA Overview. Read the Call for Review: New WAI-ARIA Documents announcement and about the Web Accessibility Initiative.

The place to start to review the WAI-ARIA documents is: http://www.w3.org/WAI/PF/ (External Link)

WAI and the Mobile Web Workgroup Issue Joint Working Draft

The Web Accessibility Initiative and the Mobile Web Workgroup have issued a working draft of a paper entitled "Relationship Between Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0 and Web Content Accessibility Guidelines," http://www.w3.org/TR/mwbp-wcag/ (External Link) which highlights the complementary aspects of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines and the Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0. In other words, making your web site accessible also makes it more accessible to people using mobile devices to access web sites.