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WAI: Strategies, guidelines, resources to make the Web accessible to people with disabilities

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   6. »Rich Internet (WAI-ARIA)
      1. Roadmap
      2. Roles
      3. States and Properties
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Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) Suite Overview

Quick links: WAI-ARIA Roadmap, WAI-ARIA Roles, WAI-ARIA States and Properties

This page introduces the WAI-ARIA Suite of technical documents. Many of the terms used in this page—including Web content, user agents, and assistive technology—are described in Introduction to Web Accessibility and Essential Components of Web Accessibility.

WAI-ARIA Suite

Dynamic Web content and rich Internet applications are developed with Ajax, DHTML, and other Web technologies. Some techniques for using these technologies to create accessible content are provided in the ARIA Techniques section of Techniques for WCAG 2.0.

WAI-ARIA defines how to make more advanced features of dynamic content and rich Internet applications accessible to people with disabilities. A primary focus of WAI-ARIA is providing information about user interface controls—such as expanding navigation bars—to assistive technology.

WAI-ARIA is introduced in a press release: W3C Announces Roadmap for Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA).

The WAI-ARIA Suite includes the following documents:

• WAI-ARIA Roadmap: Roadmap for Accessible Rich Internet Applications, a planned W3C Working Group Note
• WAI-ARIA Roles: Roles for Accessible Rich Internet Applications, a planned W3C Recommendation Web standard
• WAI-ARIA States and Properties: States and Properties Module for Accessible Rich Internet Applications, a planned W3C Recommendation Web standard

W3C Recommendations and Working Group Notes are briefly explained in How WAI Develops Accessibility Guidelines through the W3C Process, which also describes milestones in the W3C Process. WAI anticipates that the WAI-ARIA documents may progress from Last Call through to W3C Recommendation in 2007, as outlined in the Roadmap Deliverable Timeline.

Who WAI-ARIA is for

The current WAI-ARIA documents are primarily for:

• Developers of Web browsers, assistive technologies, and other user agents
• Developers of Web technologies (technical specifications)
• Developers of accessibility evaluation tools

For Web content developers and authoring tool developers, a separate document would provide best practices for implementing WAI-ARIA in Web content.

What is in the WAI-ARIA Suite

The WAI-ARIA Roadmap identifies what technology is needed to make dynamic Web content and rich Internet applications accessible. It is a gap analysis of what is needed, what is currently available, and what is missing. It defines a plan for developing in the missing pieces, which includes WAI-ARIA Roles and WAI-ARIA States and Properties.

Web browsers and other user agents use application programming interfaces (APIs) to communicate with assistive technologies. The WAI-ARIA Roadmap identifies what features of dynamic Web content needs to be communicated through accessibility APIs.

The WAI-ARIA Roadmap outlines:

• Identifying menus, primary content, secondary content, banner information, and other areas of a Web page
• Mapping controls, Ajax live regions, and events to accessibility APIs

WAI-ARIA Roles provides a dictionary of Web page features for user interaction, including navigation destinations and interactive widgets. Examples are:

• Navigation bars
• Expanding and collapsing lists, called tree controls

WAI-ARIA States and Properties enables XML languages to express how Web page features relate to each other, and their current status, or state. Examples are:

• Relationships, such as when one widget controls the contents of another part of the Web page
• States, such as whether a given branch in a tree list is expanded or collapsed

Technical document format

The WAI-ARIA documents follow the W3C format for technical specifications which includes several sections at the beginning: links to different versions, editors, copyright, abstract, and status with the link to errata and the email address for comments.

Who develops WAI-ARIA

The WAI-ARIA technical documents are developed by the Protocols and Formats Working Group (PFWG), which is part of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI). For more information about the working group, see the PFWG public page.

How WAI Develops Accessibility Guidelines through the W3C Process: Milestones and Opportunities to Contribute describes formal periods for public review. Opportunities for review and comment of WAI documents are announced on the WAI home page and WAI Interest Group mailing list. An email address for sending comments is included in the "Status of this Document" section.

Opportunities for contributing to WAI-ARIA and other WAI work are introduced in Participating in WAI.

Document Information

Content last updated: 20 december 2006
Editor: Shawn Lawton Henry. Developed with the Protocols and Formats Working Group (PFWG).

[Contacting WAI] Feedback welcome to wai-eo-editors@w3.org (a publicly archived list).