Accessibility Forum Webcast From National Science Foundation
October 30, 2001
New Slide: The Accessibility Forum
U.S. General Services Administration
Provides technical assistance for Section 508
Sponsors Accessibility Forum to address long-term solutions
Forum Staff
Government and contracted professional support
Role: facilitation and operational support
Forum Members
Wide range of Section 508 stakeholders
New Slide: Accessibility Forum Mission
The Accessibility Forum is an ongoing collaboration among stakeholders affected by Section 508 including user, industry, government, and other communities in order to benefit employees and members of the public with disabilities.
The Forum will identify, prioritize and conduct projects that assist government in making informed decisions about Section 508 related procurement, and allow government, industry, and users to communicate and highlight areas where further effort is needed.
New Slide: Forum Stakeholders
EIT Vendors
Hardware manufacturers, software developers, system integrators, web services, IT consulting, and providers of other IT support devices.
AT Vendors
Vendors and integrators of Assistive Technology (AT) including any equipment commonly used to enhance functional capabilities of individuals with disabilities.
New Slide: Forum Stakeholders
Users
End users and their advocacy groups are members and/or representatives of the community of people with disabilities.
Academic, Research, and Standards
Academic and other Researchers specializing in accessibility, and representatives of Standards making bodies related to EIT accessibility and/or AT interoperability.
Government
Representatives of Federal Government agencies.
New Slide: Accomplishments
Membership
Organizational Structure
Projects
New Slide: Strategic Management Council
Charter
Strategic Management Council
New Slide: Membership
For any Accessibility Forum Wide Issue:
Each organization provides one coordinated response
Multiple responses from an organization are returned by the Forum Staff for resolution (if some difference existed)
Voting membership organizations need to have at least one participant registered with the Forum
Any organization may provide multiple participants for any forum work effort
Over 500 people from over 300 organizations
New Slide: Projects
May Forum Meeting breakout sessions - 60 project ideas generated by 4 breakout sessions
Project Identification Team reduced 60 ideas to 13 project topics
Ballot distributed to general Forum membership
Two projects were clear favorites, receiving votes from every stakeholder group
Project 8: Enhance AT/EIT Interoperability
Project 11: Enhance the Availability of Objective Measures
Project Teams were created, initial efforts to be discussed this afternoon
New Slide: The State of the Forum
Communications Infrastructure
Website, electronic message board and threaded discussions, teleconferences, and meetings
Program Infrastructure
Forum Staff
Critical mass of organizations
Projects
Underway to develop usable products in reaching the mission goal
Its not too late to join a project
New Slide: Agenda
State of the Forum
Panel Discussions - Federal Government Perspectives on Section 508
Break – 2:50 to 3:20 PM Eastern Time
Projects Update
Meeting Wrap-Up
New Slide: Logistics
About the Facilities at NSF …
About sending questions to our presenters …
On the EVENT web page you used to tune in to the webcast you should CLICK on
“Click here to email Question to Presenters” or
Send an Email to info@tvworldwide.com
Your email program will appear addressed to the webcast
Type in your question and send the email
PLEASE IDENTIFY YOURSELF BY NAME AND ORGANIZATION
The presenter will be given a printed copy of your question
New Slide: Panel Members
Section 508 Federal Government Policy and Legislative Perspective
Melissa Wojciak, Tech and Procurement Policy Subcommittee Staff Director
Randy Cooper, Policy Advisor, Domestic Policy Council (White House Staff)
Section 508 Federal Government Implementation Perspective
Dave Capozzi, Director of Technical and Information Services, Access Board
Lee Holcomb, Chief Information Officer, NASA
Introduction Slide: Speaker Presentation
NASA CIO Perspectives on Section 508 Implementation
by Lee Holcomb
NASA Chief Information Officer
Slide 1: Introduction
Section 508 touches all areas of Electronic and Information Technology and its implementation is proving to be complex
For this discussion, we will consider four key implementation areas:
Acquisition considerations
Applicability of Section 508
Web pages
Training and education of our workforce
Slide 2: NASA CIO Perspective on Acquisitions / the first of 2 slides
The Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) specifies that requiring offices conduct market surveys to determine whether products are available in the market place that conform to specific provisions of the Access Board Standards
Both government and industry are concerned about potential legal action associated with Section 508-related acquisitions since at least some of the Access Board Standards are subject to interpretation: today we lack objective measures to determine conformance.
The Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (VPAT) was developed by industry to assist the Government in conducting market surveys
Slide 3: NASA CIO Perspective on Acquisitions / the second of 2 slides
While the VPAT is a reasonable transition approach, our early experience indicates VPAT is not the final answer
Excessive resources expended by requiring offices to interpret and deal with VPAT entries
Some major vendors do not mention VPATs for their products on their web site
Some major vendors require contacting their sales representatives to obtain information on Section 508 compliance of their products
When exception for micro-purchases expires, problem will be greatly magnified for credit card buyers
We believe aggressive effort to define objective measures for determining conformance, leading to certification, is critical
Slide 4: NASA CIO Perspective on Applicability / the first of 2 slides
Section 508 applies to all electronic and information technology with a very few exceptions, e.g.,
Undue burden
Lack of market availability
National security crypto systems
However, there are applications of technology where perhaps it is not reasonable or practical to expect conformance with Access Board Standards
Inevitable given the scope of Section 508
Slide 5: NASA CIO Perspective on Applicability / the second of 2 slides
By analogy, design of space suits for Extra-Vehicular Activity (EVA) cannot practically accommodate all extremes of physical demographics (height, weight, etc.)
We suggest that similar exceptions for electronic and information technology applications are appropriate and should be added
Would reduce unnecessary costs and delays
Would allow focusing on procurements where Section 508 can make a real difference
Slide 6: NASA CIO Perspective on Web Access / the first of 2 slides
NASA has huge, distributed, web resources
FirstGov cites over 4 million .nasa.gov web pages (about half publicly accessible)
Each center operates own sub-domain with multiple web hosts
Management of web content is distributed
Process underway to aggregate hosting of web resources at specific locations
Effort underway to put in place strong content management tools, at all sites, that will include evaluation of Section 508 compliance
NASA creates new and has major archives of multimedia
Formats include Flash, QuickTime, AVI, MPEG, PDF, PPT specialty image formats
Accessibility encoding of live data streams technologically limited
Alternative access not always possible in same time frame as media-rich stream
Accessibility encoding of production multimedia hampered by diversity of media players
Slide 7: NASA CIO Perspective on Web Access / the second of 2 slides
NASA challenges with respect to accessible legacy web pages
Consolidation of disparate web resources
How to bring archive sites up to accessible status
Elimination of duplication
Multiple “kids” pages, multiple “live data” sites, multiple stale web sites
Improving web-structure hierarchy and navigation capabilities
Space Science, Earth Science, Human Spaceflight and Aerospace web sites located at multiple NASA centers, allied universities
Multimedia
Some multimedia content creation tool vendors lagging
NASA solutions being worked or piloted
NASA Centers have submitted plans for web page remediation per our policy
New content-management solutions
Portal technology
Improve navigation capabilities
Focus on different audience segments
Allows for possible major improvement in accessibility
Slide 8: NASA CIO Perspective on Education / the first of 2 slides
NASA has distributed management and skill sets
10 Centers, HQ, and additional facilities
Multiple IT support organizations
Despite current best efforts better awareness of Section 508 needed
Education approaches
CIO-led training effort
Cross-cutting team includes IT groups, EEO offices, training offices, procurement
Agency-wide awareness online training module under development
Phase 1 is awareness for all NASA and contractors
Subsequent phases aimed specifically at supervisors, contracting and EEO officers
CIO-led Agency working group
Leveraging best practices for PDF, JavaScript, Java, Cold Fusion and other CGIs
Piloting and testing vendor solutions
Slide 9: NASA CIO Perspective on Education / the second of 2 slides
Topics for future training modules include improved/expanded guidance for
Best value
Vendor self-assessment of conformance
Compliance certification
Training, purchase and distribution of vendor tools
Site licensing and individual licensing works against NASA with its distributed approach
Some assessment and repair tools not very useful because of limited MIME support
Rapid evolution of tool sets mitigates against any major investment in acquisition and training just at the time global distribution of these tool sets would be useful
Not all tools provide operability across all relevant platforms
Some work uniquely on Unix systems, others on NT
Return from BREAK at 3:20 PM Eastern Time
Next Presentation:
Introduction to Accessibility Forum Projects
New slide: 13 Projects in 4 Categories
Survey of Existing Knowledge, Strategies, and Commercial Product Features
7 projects
Interoperability/Compatibility of AT and Commercial E&IT Products
1 major project
Tools and Measures
3 projects
Providing Information to/from the Access Board and/or GSA
2 projects
New slide: Two Initial Projects
1- Project 8: Enhance AT/EIT Interoperability
Bill Hetzner, Accessibility Forum Technical Lead
Identify, prioritize and facilitate needed E&IT and AT interoperability standards (includes analysis of problems in the AT interface that are introduced by user practices).
2- Project 11: Enhance Availability of Objective Measures Jim Kindrick, Accessibility Forum Projects Leader
Identify Section 508 provisions where objective measures may be effective and appropriate, then identify or develop such measures
Next Presentation:
Accessibility Forum Projects Update
Bill Hetzner and Jim Kindrick
Accessibility Forum Staff
New slide: Current Projects and Activities
AT/EIT Interoperability
Top vote getter, leading the way …
Good relationship with AT industry stakeholders
Objective Measures
Second vote getter, underway …
Building blocks include tools and resources inventory
Building Block Activities
Standard Terminology Glossary
Great synergy - Input is now needed from Forum members
New slide: Project Process
Meetings
Published agenda
Reported meeting discussion summary
Teleconferences so far …
Documenting team agreement
Internal working documents
Standing documents for general comment and review
Interaction with the General Accessibility Forum
General Forum meeting status reports
Strategic Management Council
New slide: Project Infrastructure
Web site – http://projects.accessibilityforum.org
Document archives
Discussion boards
E-mail
Integrated with web site discussion boards
Currently a primary channel for team communication
Teleconference meetings
Good for general announcements and status reporting
May need physical meetings as team, work products mature
New slide: Building Block Project Activities
Standard Terminology Glossary
Team
The Information Technology Technical Assistance & Training Center (ITTATC), Inclusive Technologies, Inc. and the Forum
Status
Initial collection of definitions and terms related to accessibility
Identification of terms related to the Access Board Standard for Section 508
Development of a web-site to present terms and definitions and to stimulate discussion
http://inclusive.com/508_defs_metrics/top.htm
Next Presentation:
Project Status:
Enhance AT/EIT Interoperability
Bill Hetzner
Accessibility Forum Staff
New slide: AT/EIT Interoperability Project Members
Sevelia Allen - DoD
Mary Beth Janes - Apple
Travis Brown - Apple
Al Gilman - NCITS V2
Judy Harkins - Gallaudet
Russ Isaacson - MILVETS
Bill LaPlant – U.S. Census
Randy Marsden - Mandentec
Paul Mitten - Compusult
Connie Myers - Oracle
Melinda Partin – Worktank Enterprises, LLC
June Perritt - IBM
Dave Perry - MILVETS
Dave Poehlman - ACB
Joy Relton - Unisys
Herbert Ristock - Genesys
Kurt Stuhldreher - Apple
Mark Urban - North Carolina, NCITS V2
Gregg Vanderheiden - Trace
Gottfried Zimmerman - Trace
New slide: AT/EIT Interoperability Project Progress to date
Three teleconferences and some email exchange
General agreement on:
Objectives
Scope
Process of operation
Task statement
Initiation of survey of AT and EIT vendors
Discussion on Forum role in developing software API(s)
New slide: AT/EIT Interoperability Project Plan
Objective:
To define the problem of AT/EIT interoperability, identify possible solutions, and explore implementing these solutions
Scope:
Technical and performance provisions in Section 508
Needs identified by Forum members for AT/EIT Interoperability to show adherence to these provisions
New slide: AT/EIT Interoperability Project Tasks
Develop Assistive Technology industry profile
Identify existing interoperability protocols and APIs
Analyze existing AT/EIT industry interfaces and interactions
Develop and implement selected solutions
New slide: AT/EIT Interoperability Project Deliverables
General
Specification for software API
Report on existing resources and APIs
Recommended solutions
Implementation plans
AT/EIT decision tools
By next general Forum meeting
Report of the survey on AT and EIT
Assistive Technology industry profile
New slide: AT/EIT Interoperability Project Items for Consideration
Software API
Functional specs vs. developing/adopting API(s)
How many interfaces should we deal with
Remote console: using another product as a remote user interface (liaison with NCITS V2)
Alternative interface components: capability to substitute interface component of one product for another
Compatibility: capability of a user to physically interact with the target device product
ATIA interoperability facilitation service
Questions
Next Presentation:
Project Status: Objective Measures
Jim Kindrick
Accessibility Forum Staff
New slide: Objective Measures Project Members
Charles Abernathy - Behavioral Implications Management
Abbe Buck - HighViz
Michael Cooper - CAST
Russell Isaacson – MILVETS
Steve Jacobs - NCR
Mary Beth Janes - Apple
Sharon Laskowski - NIST
David Lee – SAPMarkets
Al Lucas - Motorola
Marti McCuller – Agassa Tech.
Jim Mueller - J.L. Mueller, Inc
Connie Myers - Oracle
Melinda Partin - Worktank Enterprises
Herbert Ristock - Genesys Labs
Eugene Seagriff - Panasonic
Charles Sheppard - NIST
Kurt Stuhldreher - Apple
Joe Tozzi- US Dept. of Ed.
Gregg Vanderheiden – Trace Center
Gottfried Zimmerman - Trace Center
New slide: Objective Measures Project Progress to Date
Three teleconferences and some email exchange
General agreement on:
Process of operation
Relationship with ‘building block’ tools/resources inventories
Positive discussion towards agreement on:
Objective and Scope
Tasks and Deliverables
Beginning Analysis of the Technical Standard
Baseline activity while we develop the Project Plan
New slide: Objective Measures Project Plan
Project Plan in development as working document
Objective
Some level of general agreement, discussion still ongoing
How can project deliverables be crafted to meet the mission?
Scope
Focused by the technical and performance provisions of the Access Board Standard for Section 508
Current discussions to distinguish measures, methods of measurement, and criteria – how far should we go?
New slide: Objective Measures Project Tasks
Current working document to define Project Plan
Our most immediate task
Some other possible tasks
Analyze technical provisions of the Standard
Identify related accessibility measurement tools
Examine accessibility measurement and design processes
Investigate consistent, comparable accessibility reporting
New slide: Objective Measures Project Deliverables
Current working document to define Project Plan
Our most immediate deliverable
Deliverables being considered include:
Analysis of technical provisions of the Standard
Are some things relatively easier to measure objectively?
Section 508 accessibility measures resource database
Measures and measurement processes appropriate to each technical provision of the Standard
Existing standards, guidelines, practices, tools, etc. for measuring accessibility as related to the Section 508 Standard
Analysis of accessibility reporting techniques
New slide: Objective Measures Project Items for Consideration
Analyze technical provisions of the Standard
What things are easier and what is harder to measure?
Existing accessibility measurement tools
Which tools can be applied to measure against Section 508?
Current measurement and design processes
How do practices to help assure accessibility relate to 508?
Consistent accessibility reporting
Can comparable reporting help repeatable measurements?
Questions
Next Presentation: Forum Webcast Summary
Jack Corley
Accessibility Forum Program Manager
New slide: Accessibility Forum Accomplishments
Established organization
Wide range of interest and involvement from all stakeholder groups
Selected and launched two critical projects
New slide: Planning for the Future
Discuss the projects and their interrelationships with your peers
Follow the progress of the Forum at
http://accessibilityforum.org
Get involved with one of the projects
Join a project team or
Provide insight and feedback to project efforts
Attend the next forum
February 27 to March 1 in Denver, Colorado
New slide: Thank You!
National Science Foundation
TVWorldwide.com and AbleTV.net
Our Guest Speakers
Accessibility Forum Tiger and Project Teams
Our Audience and Forum Members
For more information: http://accessibilityforum.org
To review this WebCast: http://www.tvworldwide.com