Certifying Section 508 Compliance
Discussion
One of the issues being discussed in the Web development community is the determination of whether Section 508 compliance has been achieved. There are numerous books and articles extolling the virtues of Section 508 compliance and making Web sites accessible, and there are also numerous sources of information describing the Section 508 requirements and how to technically code for them. However, none of them describe how to objectively determine if a site is Section 508-compliant.
The main reason why it is not possible to objectively determine whether a site is Section 508 compliant is because of the way the rules are written. They can be interpreted broadly or narrowly. Just attempting to comply with a rule requires a certain amount of subjective, as opposed to objective, decision-making. For example, Rule (a) requires a text equivalent for every non-text element. What is a text equivalent? There is no way a tool can objectively determine from a photo or a graphic what the usage of that image is and what an adequate text equivalent is. This requires human decision-making.
The tools used for evaluation and repair can give the user different information on whether a site is accessible. At this time, the tools differ in their capabilities. (For more information on tool evaluations, see Evaluation and Repair Tool Ratings.) While one tool might find the page accessible or in compliance with Section 508, another tool might not.
Next, a site may appear to be inaccessible if accessed with certain user agents. The good news is that the industry realizes that they can't just create any possible tool in the world and require the government to conform to it. Hence, the W3C is creating standards for different types of user agents. New user agents are being designed to conform to those requirements. However, there is nothing in the Section 508 requirements that requires that a page be capable of being rendered well by all user agents, or even those that meet the W3C guidelines.
Furthermore, it is not a requirement of Section 508 that HTML code be validated against standard grammars. It is an accessibility requirement (as required by the WAI). User agents such as Internet Explorer appear to ignore weird coding problems a good deal of the time. However, a user agent being built to run on standard grammars might have difficulty deciding how to interpret invalid code, and may render the page in an unexpected manner.
How to Maximize Section 508 Compliance
Use the programming tips on this site (see Implementing Section 508) and elsewhere (see Resources for sources) to incorporate coding that will ensure compliance.
Use evaluation and repair tools to catch those few things you might have missed.
Assemble a testing team of people using a variety of user agents, and who have a variety of physical capabilities, to test the site. If it passes muster by them, it should be reasonably compliant.
Certification or Approval by Other Organizations
The National Federation of the Blind can evaluate your Web site, and if it passes evaluation, allow you to use a seal of approval. For more information, visit The National Federation of the Blind. It seems that a number of private companies see opportunity in getting on the certification bandwagon.