

RE: WAI Guidelines Naming

From: Jason White <jasonw@ariel.ucs.unimelb.EDU.AU>
Date: Sun, 1 Feb 1998 10:20:48 +1100 (AEDT)
Message-ID: <Pine.SUN.3.95.980201101038.24162B-100000@ariel.ucs.unimelb.EDU.AU>
The treatment of HTML by user agents is for the most part regulated by the
HTML specification itself. The guidelines would only need to emphasise the
importance of compliance. Moreover, is it not the case that we only want
to influence the user agent's handling of HTML in so far as it affects the
manner in which the document will be presented to the user, which is a
function of the user interface?

The guidelines prepared by the UI group will have several functions, but I
think it would be a mistake to limit them only to client software,
browsers, user agents or whatever synonymous term is chosen. Perhaps they
could be called "user interface and browser design guidelines". This
would be a reflection of the fact that many of the recommendations would
apply to web-based software generally, including authoring tools, and that
as well as including directions specific to browsers, the guidelines
discuss general user interface considerations to which reference can then
be made in other documents, such as the authoring tool guidelines. Thus,
the UI group would be largely responsible for addressing issues of user
interface design; the AU group would consider these questions to the
extent to which there are special aspects of the user interface that are
specific to authoring software.

Since the title is the first element of a document which is encountered by
a reader, it is important that it be brief and at the same time capture
the essence of the document's substantive content.
Received on Saturday, 31 January 1998 18:21:15 GMT
