[Irl-dean] AAA Claim?

[Joshue O Connor]

Hi Brendan,

> What I would like to ask the list is does anyone feel it is acceptable
> to have and claim AAA accessibility for the rest of the website but to
> have an archive page which is only AA accessible containing these
> documents? 

I would venture to say (and this is purely my own opinion) that is may
even be better to consolidate the good work you and your client have
done and give the entire site a WCAG 1.0 AA compliant level only. To be
frank if I see a site with AAA all over it I am immediately kinda
suspicious. I suggest that you do the work necessary to make the PDF
documents etc accessible but I would offer that merely claiming
compliance is not important, just do it and make it work. Its very
important to remember that its the accessibility of the site and the
resources that it contains thats of importance, and not merely
compliance with the guidelines.

To clarify, I am not in accord with parts of WCAG 1.0, esp certain
Priority 3 recommendations. These are specifically, but not limited to:

> 9.5 Provide keyboard shortcuts to important links (including those in client-side image maps), form controls, and groups of form controls. [Priority 3] 

Access keys are generally not a good idea (for reasons that I don't even
want to go into - just ask John Foliot [1] [2] [3]) and the implication
of this guideline is that you should use them as a mechanism for
navigation of your web pages. I say - "If the semantics of your web page
etc are sound then it is already pretty navigable", so there is no need
to apply other less-than-ideal mechanisms. Having said all that there
can be instances where the use of accesskeys may be useful, when used
sensibly in dynamic Web 2.0 type applications and myself and Gez have
been exploring this over the past year or so.

> 10.4 Until user agents handle empty controls correctly, include default, place-holding characters in edit boxes and text areas. [Priority 3] (Checkpoint 10.4)

This is just plain bad practice and should not be followed at all. There
is simply no need as sufficient semantics can be gleaned using label
elements etc. So at the time it was a good idea,,,, but now its
certainly _not_ a good idea. So as Shakespeare would say, heres the rub.
If your client wants their site to be AAA compliant these are things
that you need to do to make your site fit the guidelines, if you follow
the guidelines as canonical absolutes. But I would daresay that these
practices can cause more accessibility problems than they solve. So
where does that leave us in the advice that we give our clients who are
eager to be seen to be as compliant as possible and wave their hard
earned AAA flag? I guess this is where a good accessibility head earns
his crust - as you've got to explain that its fine for them to go for AA
and cherry pick some of the better recommendations from the AAA, but
explain clearly why.

These points  may not even be issues with WCAG 2.0 but at the moment
they are; so you must use your better judgment and advise your client
accordingly.

> Laurence said:
>> More important than wearing the badge is whether the site provides a
>> genuine usable experience for all  their visitors, something better
>> *measured* through user testing rather than *ticking off* the
>> guidelines. 


I agree, but there can be need to explain this very clearly to your
client especially when what they may see as a tangible benefit - in the
form of the nice AAA logo - may be denied them. There are other aspects
of WCAG 1.0 that I would have issues with (as I am sure others on the
list do) but I just wish to illustrate my line of thought.

Josh

[1] http://www.wats.ca/show.php?contentid=47
[2] http://www.wats.ca/show.php?contentid=32
[3] http://www.wats.ca/show.php?contentid=43

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