Summary

Martin Kliehm and I were both very pleased with our core conversation about WAI-ARIA at SXSW. The idea behind core conversations is to formalise conversations that take place in the corridors.

Author: Gez Lemon

Core Conversation

We were very fortunate to have some very knowledgeable people participate, such as Becky Gibson, Shawn Henry, Lisa Pappas, Sharron Rush, Niqui Merret, Michael Stenitzer, Ian Lloyd, and many others (apologies for not mentioning everyone by name). Becky was one of the original architects that developed ARIA at IBM before it was donated to the W3C. Since then, Becky has been working on incorporating ARIA into the Dojo javascript toolkit. Sharron, Lisa, Becky and Susan Gerhart did a panel on Accessible Rich Media the day before, and Becky demonstrated an email client built with Dojo and the accessibility features afforded by ARIA.

After Martin gave a brief overview of ARIA, Becky started the conversation by outlining some of her experiences, which prompted lots of good questions. Nobody, apart from Becky, had actually implemented ARIA in their projects, but we were encouraged that most of the participants were making plans to implement it.

All in all, we had a great time, and it was great to meet so many people with a passion for the web. This was my first time at SXSW, but I hope I'm able to go again. Austin is an amazing city, and the whole festival has a great vibe. Unfortunately, I caught a cold at the end, which turned heavy and has only just started to clear.

Category: Accessibility.

Comments

  1. [sxsw-core-conversation.php#comment1]

    I have not personally been to this event but I have heard of some great conversations that have taken place. My friends that have gone tell me everyone is nice and seemed to come back inspired with new ideas to start incorporating. I guess I should try to make the next one...maybe I'll get enlightened. Did you find a lot of people that were going to actually begin implementing ARIA?

    Posted by jessica on

  2. [sxsw-core-conversation.php#comment2]

    the core conversation idea sounds great, and i wish i could have been there this year. had a blast when i went to my first south-by last year, despite getting some rather annoying stomach bug while i was there...

    Posted by patrick h. lauke on

  3. [sxsw-core-conversation.php#comment3]

    Sounds a great conversation.

    And I've made a note to self to avoid Austin, as it sounds like it has a deleterious effect on the constitution!

    Posted by bruce on

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