Web Accessibility Initiative Evaluation and Repair Interest Group Charter
(WAI-ER-IG)
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Mission statement
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Scope
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Duration
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Deliverables
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Dependencies of other groups on this group's deliverables
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Dependencies of this group on other groups' deliverables
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Intended degree of confidentiality
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Relation to other groups
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Milestones for work items & deliverables
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Meeting mechanisms & schedules
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Communication mechanisms
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Voting mechanisms
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Level of involvement of Team
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W3C staff contact
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Estimate of time commitment a group member would have to
make in order to participate.
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Participants.
1. Mission statement
The Evaluation and Repair Interest Group (ER IG) will work with the ER Working
Group (ER WG) on tools for
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evaluating the accessibility of web sites
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repairing sites when necessary to improve accessibility.
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filtering site content to improve accessibility
ER IG will collect and analyze input from all people who use or benefit from
these tools, including users with disabilities, web authors and administrators,
content owners, and tool vendors.
2. Scope
2.1. Scope of work items
2.1.1. Type of Tool Users
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Users with disabilities, including novice and expert users of the web.
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Web site authors and administrators.
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Internet Service Providers (ISP's).
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Web content owners, i.e. the people or organizations whose information
is being presented on the web.
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Vendors of tools, including stand-alone tools, and assistive
technology modules that might be
used in authoring or browsing software.
2.1.2. Information sought:
For all the types of users listed above, and for initial and future versions
of the tools:
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What features are needed for an evaluation tool? This includes
the question of "rating", e.g. what if any weighting factors should
be given to problems the evaluation tools detect?
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What features are needed for a repair tool?
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What features are needed for "filtering tools" used by end users
to help make sites accessible to them.
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How should features be packaged?
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How should tools be made most usable?
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Once tools are completed (e.g. in beta) what improvement may be made?
2.1.2. Sources of input:
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Direct advice from members of the group.
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The user populations listed above.
2.1.3. Methodology:
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Expert advice (e.g. from WG IG group members.)
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Experiment (e.g. asking users to judge two versions of a page.)
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Collection and analysis feedback from beta testing by novice and expert users..
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Informal surveys of users, both novice and expert.
2.2. Criteria for success
Success of the evaluation and repair tools will be gauged by informal surveys
of users and testimonial opinions from organizations regarding:
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Increased accessibility provided by the tools.
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Ease of use of the tools.
Success will result from the joint efforts of ER WG and ER IG, and indeed all
of the Web Accessibility Initiative. The individual contribution of
the ER IG will be measured by examining survey results and testimonials regarding
features to which the ER IG particularly contributed.
3. Duration of work items
In view of the constant stream of new technology whose accessibility must
be evaluated, the expected duration of the ER-IG is two years, at which time
the group should be re-chartered for the duration of WAI work.
4. Deliverables
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Recommendations for the questions listed under Scope
/Information Sought (Section 2.1.2 above) shall be posted.
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A list of issues shall be maintained which shall include whether the issue
was resolved and the resolution if any.
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A high level description of the processes used to collect input and
make recommendations.
5. Dependencies of other groups on this group
5.1. Groups which will use deliverables
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The Evaluation and Repair Working Group (WAI-ER-WG) will use our deliverables
as input. The results will need to be delivered in a timely way for
their development schedule.
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Any results we obtain with implications for authoring tools or
user agents will be offered to the respective groups (WAI-AU and WAI-UA).
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An overview of our process will be offered to the Education and Outreach
Group (WAI-EO) to help that group's outreach efforts.
5.2. Liaison Methods
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Documents published on the groups web sites.
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Meetings between chairs (WAI-CG) as needed.
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Participation of ER IG members in the ER WG.
6. Dependencies of this group on other groups
6.1. Groups whose work will be used:
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WAI Page Author Guidelines Working Group (WAI-GL). We will use the author
guidelines as a basis for discussion.
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WAI Evaluation and Repair Working Group (WAI-ER-WG): We will look to this
group for tools and plans for tools which may raise issues.
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WAI User Agent Working Group (WAI-UA) and Authoring Tools Working Group (WAI-AU).
We will look to these groups for problem solutions that might be brought
into stand-alone tools.
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WAI Education and Outreach Working Group (WAI-EO) for feedback they may receive
in the course of their outreach efforts.
6.2. Required time of delivery.
The Page Author Guidelines are already complete enough for initial work of
this group to begin. Input regarding plans and completed tools of
the ER-WG will of course depend on when those plans and tools are delivered,
but no requirements are set here.
7. Intended degree of Confidentiality
Group home page, proceedings, deliverables, and charter will all be public.
8. Relation to other groups
8.1. Relation to W3C Groups
This group is related to other W3C groups via the dependencies on deliverables
described in sections 5 and 6 above.
In addition,
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This group is related to the WAI Education and Outreach Group (WAI-EO) in
that both will communicate with user communities.
8.2. Relation to External Groups
In general, we will seek input from groups of the users identified above,
including
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Groups of users with disabilities, including groups whose missions range
from socialization and support to advocacy.
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Organizations of web site developers and administrators
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Organizations of tool vendors
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Research institutions concerned with disability, including universities,
government, and other non-profit groups.
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Organizations of usability specialists.
9. Milestones for work items & deliverables
Recommendations will be packaged as the following series of deliverables.
However, informal communications will also be delivered to ER WG on
other issues as they arise, especially if their quick resolution is needed
by ER WG
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Initial recommendations for major issues and concerns: 6 weeks
after start of mailing list activity.
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More in-depth recommendations: 9 weeks after start.
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Evaluations of beta tools: For each tool, initial review 2 weeks
after tool availability. Final review 4 weeks after tool availability.
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Additional Milestones and Commitment Dates: 6 weeks after
start.
The times at which the other deliverables will be produced will depend on
the issues that arise and the number of people available to address them.
10. Meeting mechanisms & schedules
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primary meeting mechanism:
w3c-wai-er-ig
list
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bi-weekly to monthly meeting: by phone
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quarterly (roughly) meeting: face-to-face
11. Communication mechanisms
11.1 Communication within the group
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w3c-wai-er-ig
list
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/WAI/ER/IG
group home page
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monthly to bi-weekly phone meetings
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quarterly face-to-face meetings
11.2. Communication with W3C
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Coordination through WAI Coordination Group to other WAI working groups and
interest groups
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Direct postings to the WAI Interest Group (WAI-IG).
- Report at WAI Interest Group face-to-face meeting (every 4 month on average).
11.3. Communication with the public
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Through public home page.
12. Voting mechanisms and Escalation
There will be one vote per member (even if there are multiple members from
a particular organization). Votes shall be submitted via email.
(This differs from the W3C voting process for formal W3C process
because these are not formal W3C recommendations)
Escalation of issues within ER IG or between ER WG and IG goes to the WAI
Coordination Group.
13. Level of involvement of Team
10% Daniel Dardailler
14. W3C staff contact
Daniel Dardailler (danield@w3.org)
15. Estimated time and effort commitments a group member would have to make
in order to participate
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minimum 3 hours per week. Of course, greater commitment is welcome.
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remain current on
w3c-wai-er-ig
list and respond in timely manner
to postings
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participate in bi-weekly to monthly phone meetings or send regrets to chair.
16. Participants
It is crucial to have representation from all people who will be using
the tools and the people who will benefit from their use.
We therefore seek participants who can give expert opinion of their own,
plus participants who can collect information from people who would
not normally be represented (e.g. non-technical web content owners, people
with little or no experience surfing the web).
This requires participation from people who are themselves
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Users with disabilities
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Web site content owners
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Web site authors, administrators
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Tool vendors
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Experts on disabilities
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Experts on usability
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As well as people who will reach out to obtain input from
novice users, non-technical web site content owners, and any other people
who might not normally participate directly.
The chair of this group is Len Kasday.
Leonard Kasday
Daniel Dardailler
Main version: June 30, 1998
Minor updates: August 23, 1999