WAC Accessibility Conference Update

Conference details Aiming for Accessibility Conference University of Guelph June 8-9,

AODA Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Web accessibility: Accessible Information and Communications Standard

Web standards History: WCAG 2.0 Level AA WCAG 2.0 Level A Current & Future: WCAG 2.0 Level A & AA Hybrid WCAG 2.0 Level AA

WCAG 2.0 Level AA Customize Quick Reference to include: Techniques and Failures: HTML, CSS, SMIL, Client-side Scripting, Server-side Scripting, WAI-ARIA Success Criteria Levels: A, AA (Hidden: AAA) Sections: Introduction, Sufficient Techniques and Failures, Advisory Techniques, Conformance Requirements

Waterloo direction Recommendation to start with Level AA Expected future direction of AODA High effort to retrofit websites

Expected timelines for new standards implementation Clear as mud... Start implementation in 2011 Achieve compliance for but still TBD

Other items Plan for accessibility (design, technology, training, effort to retrofit) Education (training) is key (e.g. alt tags, meaningful links) Validators are not enough (e.g. meaningful links) Make web forms accessible (e.g. keyboard navigation must work) Avoid Flash (good general rule) Test JavaScript for accessibility (and minimize use) Remember to caption videos Accessible documents (PDF, Word, PowerPoint) Accessible alternatives (PDFs, web pages/content)