W3C Invites Implementations of Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 (Candidate Recommendation)

2008-04-30: The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) Working Group has released Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 2.0 as a Candidate Recommendation, and published updated Working Drafts of Understanding WCAG 2.0 and Techniques for WCAG 2.0, along with How to Meet WCAG 2.0 and Comparison of WCAG 1.0 Checkpoints to WCAG 2.0. WCAG defines how to make Web sites, Web applications, and other Web content accessible to people with disabilities. Working closely with Web developers, the WCAG Working Group expects to receive initial implementations by 30 June 2008 and to show evidence of meeting the exit criteria by 31 August 2008. Read the press release, invitation to implement, Overview of WCAG 2.0 Documents, and about the Web Accessibility Initiative. (Permalink)

Canonical XML Version 1.1 Is a W3C Recommendation

2008-05-02: The XML Core Working Group has published the W3C Recommendation of Canonical XML Version 1.1. Canonical XML Version 1.1 is a revision to Canonical XML Version 1.0 to address issues related to inheritance of attributes in the XML namespace when canonicalizing document subsets, including the requirement not to inherit xml:id, and to treat xml:base URI path processing properly. Canonical XML Version 1.1 is applicable to XML 1.0 and defined in terms of the XPath 1.0 data model. It is not defined for XML 1.1. As a Recommendation, this is a stable document and may be used as reference material or cited from another document. Learn more about the Extensible Markup Language (XML) Activity. (Permalink)

W3C Talks in May

2008-05-01: Browse W3C presentations and events also available as an RSS channel. (Permalink)

• 5 May, Eindhoven, The Netherlands: XBRL and the Semantic Web.Ivan Herman participates in a panel at 17th International XBRL Conference.
• 5 May, Eindhoven, The Netherlands: What is the Semantic Web?.Ivan Herman presents at 17th International XBRL Conference.
• 6 May, Gelsenkirchen, Germany: Verordnete (Barriere-)Freiheit.Shadi Abou-Zahra participates in a panel at Einfach-für-Alle Tagung.
• 6 May, Dublin, Ireland: XForms 1.1.Steven Pemberton gives a tutorial at XTech 2008.
• 8 May, Dublin, Ireland: Why you should have a Website.Steven Pemberton presents at XTech 2008.
• 8 May, Dublin, Ireland: CSS Advanced Layout is not only for big grids.Bert Bos presents at XTech 2008.
• 14 May, Stockholm, Sweden: Internationalisering och lokalisering -- språk på webben.Olle Olsson presents at Språk och Internet.
• 18 May, San Jose, CA, USA: State of the Semantic Web.Ivan Herman presents at 2008 Semantic Technology Conference.
• 19 May, Canberra, Australia: Improving Government through better use of the Web.José Manuel Alonso gives a keynote at Web Directions South: Government.
• 20 May, Barcelona, Spain: Fast Forward: Get Ready for Web 3.0.Steve Bratt gives a keynote at bdigital Global Congress.
• 21 May, Sydney, Australia: Towards eGovernment 2.0.José Manuel Alonso gives a keynote at eGovernment Forum at CeBIT.
• 22 May, San Jose, CA, USA: Bringing SemTech Back to the Business.Ivan Herman participates in a panel at 2008 Semantic Technology Conference.
• 27 May, London, United Kingdom: One Big Happy Family: Practical Collaboration on Meaningful Markup .Dan Brickley presents at Microformats vEvent.
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XProc: An XML Pipeline Language Draft Published

2008-05-01: The XML Processing Model Working Group has published a Working Draft of XProc: An XML Pipeline Language. This specification describes the syntax and semantics of XProc: An XML Pipeline Language, a language for describing operations to be performed on XML documents. Pipelines are made up of simple steps which perform atomic operations on XML documents and constructs similar to conditionals, iteration, and exception handlers, which control which steps are executed. The status section of the document lists the most important changes since the previous draft. Learn more about the Extensible Markup Language (XML) Activity. (Permalink)

Product Modelling Incubator Group to Identify Basic Ontology for Product Modelling

2008-05-01: W3C is pleased to announce the creation of the Product Modelling Incubator Group, sponsored by W3C Members TNO, POSC-Caesar Association, and Fraunhofer. Per the charter, the SWOP and S-TEN projects, with the POSC Caesar Association, believe that it is possible to define a small core of basic classes and properties for product modelling. This "product core" could be the basis of the ontologies defined by the two projects, and for many other application ontologies. This core could help the development of Web ontologies derived from existing international standards, such as IFC, STEP and ISO 15926. The XG has been proposed to work on this core set. Read more about the Incubator Activity, an initiative to foster development of emerging Web-related technologies. Incubator Activity work is not on the W3C standards track. (Permalink)

W3C Welcomes Members at Advisory Committee Meeting in Beijing

2008-04-21: W3C holds its semiannual Advisory Committee Meeting on 21-22 April in Beijing, China. W3C Member organizations participate in two days of discussions and strategic planning about W3C Activities and future work. The meeting takes place alongside WWW2008; you are invited to the W3C Track at WWW2008. The media are invited to a press conference with Tim Berners-Lee on 23 April at 3pm local time. Learn how to become a W3C Member and attend the next Advisory Committee Meeting in October 2008 (part of Technical Plenary Week) in Cannes, France. (Photo credit: Ian Jacobs. Permalink)

SVG Working and Interest Groups Chartered

2008-04-16: W3C is pleased to announce the relaunch of the SVG Working Group. Erik Dahlström (Opera Software ASA) and Andrew Emmons (W3C Invited Expert) continue to chair the group, which is chartered to work in public to continue the evolution of Scalable Vector Graphics as a format and a platform, and enhance the adoption and usability of SVG in combination with other technologies. A new SVG Interest Group is also chartered to foster the widespread discussion of Scalable Vector Graphics as a format and a platform, to gather requirements, and enhance the adoption and usability of SVG in combination with other technologies. Learn more about Scalable Vector Graphics. (Permalink)

Feedback Sought on Web Compatibility Test for Mobile Browsers

2008-04-16: The Mobile Web Test Suites Working Group has released a stable version of its Web Compatibility Test for Mobile Browsers, and has sent an invitation to the community to share reports of browser support and other feedback on the test itself. Read more about the design of the test. Read more about the W3C Mobile Web Initiative. (Permalink)

Three RIF Working Drafts Published

2008-04-15: The Rule Interchange Format (RIF) Working Group published three drafts today:

• RIF Basic Logic Dialect (RIF-BLD)
• RIF Framework for Logic Dialects (RIF-FLD)
• RIF RDF and OWL Compatibility (RIF-RDF-OWL)

These drafts help solidify the "pure logic rules" branch of RIF, which is distinct from the "production rules" branch (on which a Working Draft is expected within the next 6 months). Both branches share "RIF Core" (also expected within the next 6 months). The Framework document (FLD) specifies how the various logic dialects relate, while the Basic Logic Dialect (BLD) provides an interlingua for rule languages providing approximately "Horn" expressivity. The third document specifies how BLD can be logically combined with RDF and OWL. Learn more about the Semantic Web Activity. (Permalink)

ISOC-IL New Host of W3C Israel Office

2008-04-15: W3C is pleased to announce that the Israel Chapter of the Internet Society (ISOC-IL) is the new host of the W3C Israel Office. Ori Idan will manage the Office from ISOC-IL. W3C wishes to thank Michel Bercovier and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem for hosting the W3C Israel Office since 1999; Michel will remain involved as senior advisor. Learn more about the the W3C Offices, which promote adoption of W3C Recommendations in local regions among developers, application builders, and other regional stake-holders. (Permalink)

Last Call: The XMLHttpRequest Object

2008-04-15: The Web API Working Group has published the Last Call Working Draft of The XMLHttpRequest Object. The XMLHttpRequest Object specification defines an API that provides scripted client functionality for transferring data between a client and a server. Comments are welcome through 2 June. Learn more about the Rich Web Client Activity. (Permalink)

Delivery Context Ontology Draft Published

2008-04-15: The Ubiquitous Web Applications Working Group has published a Working Draft of Delivery Context Ontology. The Delivery Context Ontology provides a formal model of the characteristics of the environment in which devices interact with the Web or other services. The delivery context is an important source of information that can be used to adapt materials to make them useable on a wide range of different devices with different capabilities. The delivery context includes the characteristics of the device, the software used to access the service and the network providing the connection among others. This document describes the ontology (using OWL) and gives details of each property that it contains. Learn more about the Ubiquitous Web Applications Activity. (Permalink)

Web Services Internationalization Draft Published

2008-04-15: The Internationalization Core Working Group has published a Working Draft of Web Services Internationalization (WS-I18N). This document describes enhancements to SOAP messaging to provide internationalized and localized operations using locale and international preferences. These mechanisms can be used to accommodate a wide variety of development models for international usage. Learn more about the Internationalization Activity. (Permalink)

Device Description Repository Core Vocabulary Group Note Published

2008-04-15: The Mobile Web Initiative Device Description Working Group has published a Group Note of Device Description Repository Core Vocabulary. This document identifies properties that are considered essential for adaptation of content in the Mobile Web. Its intended use is to define a baseline Vocabulary for Device Description Repository (DDR) implementations. The Vocabulary defined in this document is not intended to represent an exhaustive set of properties for content adaptation. DDR Implementations that require additional properties are free to make use of additional vocabularies. The process of creating a new Vocabulary can be modeled on the process described in this document. Learn more about the Mobile Web Initiative Activity. (Permalink)

Incubator Group Report: Uncertainty Reasoning for the World Wide Web

2008-04-15: The Uncertainty Reasoning for the World Wide Web Incubator Group published their final report. The document includes a set of use case descriptions that illustrate situations for reasoning under uncertainty; some of the use cases include comprehensive information and details on how uncertainty would help to address issues that cannot be properly addressed with current deterministic approaches. The document also identifies methodologies that may be applied to address the use cases and that show promise as candidate solutions for uncertainty reasoning on the scale of the World Wide Web. This publication is part of the Incubator Activity, a forum where W3C Members can innovate and experiment. This work is not on the W3C standards track. (Permalink)

Incubator Group Report: Common Web Language

2008-04-15: The Common Web Language Incubator Group published their final report. The goal of the Common Web Language is to allow the exchange of information through the Web and also for enabling computers to process information semantically. CWL allows people to describe contents and meta-data of Web pages written in natural language; the language seeks to lower language barriers and to facilitate the automatic extraction of information from Web pages. This publication is part of the Incubator Activity, a forum where W3C Members can innovate and experiment. This work is not on the W3C standards track. (Permalink)