W3C Invites Implementations of TTML Profiles for Internet Media Subtitles and Captions 1.2

The Timed Text Working Group has published a Candidate Recommendation of TTML Profiles for Internet Media Subtitles and Captions 1.2. This specification defines two profiles of [ttml2]: a text-only profile and an image-only profile. These profiles are intended to be used across subtitle and caption delivery applications worldwide, thereby simplifying interoperability, consistent rendering and conversion to other subtitling and captioning formats. This specification improves on [ttml-imsc1.1] by supporting contemporary practices, while retaining compatibility with [ttml-imsc1.1] documents. It provides one new feature, which permits external font files to be referenced explicitly. One existing feature has been clarified, and no features have been deprecated in this version.

First Public Working Draft: RTC Accessibility User Requirements (RAUR)

The Accessible Platform Architectures (APA) Working Group with the Research Questions Task Force (RQTF) has published a First Public Working Draft of the Working Group Note RTC Accessibility User Requirements (RAUR). RAUR outlines user needs, requirements, and scenarios for real-time communication (RTC) to be accessible to people with disabilities. Accessible telecommunication technology is increasingly important for people who are working remotely and relying on RTC for daily needs. The purpose of this document is to inform the development of specifications and underlying architecture at W3C and beyond. Some of the requirements apply at the system or platform level, and some are authoring requirements. RQTF would particularly like input on any user needs or requirements that are missing from this draft. For more information, see the blog post RTC Accessibility User Requirements – Call for Review.

DOM Review Draft 18 June 2019 Endorsed as a W3C Candidate Recommendation

As part of working with the WHATWG together on HTML and DOM, W3C selected today to endorse the first WHATWG DOM Review Draft as a Candidate Recommendation. DOM defines a platform-neutral model for events, aborting activities, and node trees. This document is published for purposes of patent review by WHATWG Workstream Participants and as a W3C Candidate Recommendation. We invite the community to provide feedback until 14 April 2020.

SEO Tools for optimizing websites

As a fairly technical discipline, there are many tools and software that SEOs rely on to help with optimizing websites. Below are some commonly used free and paid tools:

• Google Search Console - Google Search Console (formerly known as "Google Webmaster Tools") is a free tool provided by Google, and is a standard tool in the SEO's toolkit. GSC provides rankings and traffic reports for top keywords and pages, and can help identify and fix on-site technical issues.
• Google Ads Keyword Planner - Keyword Planner is another free tool provided by Google, as part of their Google Ads product. Even though it is designed for paid search, it can be a great tool to use for SEO since it provides keyword suggestions and keyword search volume, which can be helpful when doing keyword research.
• Backlink Analysis Tools - There are a number of link analysis tools out there, the two primary ones being AHREFs and Majestic. Backlink analysis tools allow users to analyze which websites are linking to their own website, or the websites of competitors, and can be used to find new links during link building.
• SEO Platforms - There are many different SEO platforms that bring together many of the tools that SEOs need to optimize sites. Some of the most popular include Moz, BrightEdge, Searchmetrics, and Linkdex. These platforms track keyword rankings, help with keyword research, identify on-page and off-page SEO opportunities, and many other tasks related to SEO.
• Social Media - Most social media sites don't have a direct impact on SEO, but they can be a good tool for networking with other webmasters and building relationships that can lead to link building and guest posting opportunities.

Macmillan Learning and Fondazione LIA win the ABC 2020 Awards

We are happy to share that W3C Members Macmillan Learning and Fondazione LIA are the winners of the Accessible Books Consortium’s 2020 International Excellence Awards for Accessible Publishing.

Macmillan Learning was recognized in the publisher category as the first Global Certified Accessible (GCA) publisher producing products and learning materials in accessible formats for students with different kinds of vision impairment.

Fondazione LIA was recognized in the initiative category for their achievements in improving the accessibility of e-books and other digital publications for people who are blind, visually impaired or otherwise print-disabled.

“Macmillan Learning feels strongly that knowledge sharing is important, and for us accessibility speaks to the core of our mission – to improve lives through learning. The needs for accessible educational materials are universal and extend beyond an area of focus for one publisher in one country. We look forward to continuing to be part of a solution that enables students of all abilities to have a great learning experience.“
Rachel Comerford, Senior Director, Content Standards and Accessibility, Macmillan Learning

“We are really pleased that the work done by the LIA Foundation to create awareness on accessibility in the publishing industry has been recognized. This is a further stimulus to pursue our goal of creating a fully inclusive publishing ecosystem where all readers have the same opportunity to choose what they want in the publishers’ catalogues. A special thanks goes to all our stakeholders, the Italian Publishers Association and the Italian publishers, the Italian Blind and Visual Impaired Union, the Italian Dyslexia Association and the Biblioteca di Monza, without whose precious collaboration this would not be possible.“
Cristina Mussinelli, Secretary General, Fondazione LIA

This prestigious award is a noted event in the field of accessibility, in a context where over 253 million people worldwide are blind or have severe to moderate vision impairment and more than 90% of these are resident in developing countries, where the World Blind Union estimates that people who are blind have only a one in ten chance of going to school or getting a job. The lack of accessible books is a very real barrier to getting an education and leading an independent, productive life, and a reason why the Accessible Book Consortium seeks to recognize leadership and achievements in advancing the accessibility of e-books and other digital materials.

Join us in celebrating the 31st birthday of the World Wide Web

In March 1989 Sir Tim Berners-Lee wrote “Information Management: A Proposal” and with that quiet act launched an idea, the World Wide Web, that has changed our lives forever.

The Web was envisioned by Tim as a global information-sharing space that would connect people and encourage understanding and sharing of knowledge. It is now an indispensable, exciting and, in some cases a vital global commons. We are incredibly grateful to our Director, Tim Berners-Lee, for the invention of the Web, for founding the World Wide Web Consortium, for all his work to keep the Web open, international, accessible, and for his decades of inspiration to so many of us.

For 25 years, the Web Consortium has developed the foundational technical standards upon which the Web has flourished. Please read more about our values in our blog post.

If you are part of our community, helping to develop technologies for the web with the Web Consortium, thank you. Let others know that the Web was made to work for everyone. Let your family and friends know why your work at the Web Consortium –to make a web for all– matters.

Thank you again, Tim! Happy Birthday, World Wide Web!

Let’s all keep doing our part to keep making the Web and the world better.

The Web Consortium: making the web work, for everyone.

W3C Team interim travel restrictions and guidance for continuity of operations

Effective immediately and through 15 May, the W3C Team travel policy prescribes that all international travel is suspended and staff are urged to consider the importance of any domestic travel before agreeing to domestic travel other than commuting. Remote teleconferencing is recommended in place of travel.

W3C Management also recommends that all W3C groups not hold physical face-to-face meetings and should instead plan virtual equivalents. W3M plans on updating the guidance as conditions continue to evolve no later than March 26.

To that effect the W3C Team has started to draft an addition to the Guidebook: Continuity of Operations under Travel Restrictions

Our primary concern is individual and community health. Slowing the spread of the COVID-19 virus improves the chances that health systems will have the capacity to continue to treat usual health issues plus those affected.

• Individual and community health: take care of yourselves and those around you. Even if an individual is not personally at-risk, COVID-19 may be contagious before symptoms appear.
• Unpredictability of border measures and quarantines: international travelers risk getting caught far from home or facing quarantine.
• Unpredictability of meeting plans: many conferences are being canceled, and many localities are canceling large gatherings.

Updated Candidate Recommendations for JSON-LD 1.1

The JSON-LD Working Group invites implementations of two revised Candidate Recommendations:

• JSON-LD 1.1 defines a JSON-based expression of Linked Data graphs. The syntax is designed to easily integrate into deployed systems that already use JSON, and provides a smooth upgrade path from JSON to JSON-LD. It enables the creation of more easily interoperable Web services, the ability to store Linked Data in JSON-based storage engines, and brings more meaningful data to Web services and APIs.
• JSON-LD 1.1 Processing Algorithms and API defines an Application Programming Interface (API) for developers implementing a set of algorithms for programmatic transformations of JSON-LD documents.

Candidate Recommendation means that the Working Group considers the technical design to be complete and is seeking implementation feedback on the documents. The group is keen to get comments and implementation experiences on these specifications as issues raised in the documents’ respective GitHub repositories (see the document headers for the exact references).

The group expects to satisfy the implementation goals (i.e., at least two, independent implementations for each of the test cases) by 3 April 2020

Four First Public Working Drafts published by the CSS Working Group

The CSS Working Group has published four First Public Working Drafts today:

• CSS Color Module Level 5 extends CSS Color [css-color-4] to add color modification functions.
• Media Queries Level 5 allows authors to test and query values or features of the user agent or display device, independent of the document being rendered. They are used in the CSS @media rule to conditionally apply styles to a document, and in various other contexts and languages, such as HTML and JavaScript.
• CSS Transforms Module Level 2 allows elements styled with CSS to be transformed in two-dimensional or three-dimensional space. This spec adds new tranform functions and properties for three-dimensional transforms, and convenience functions for simple transforms.
• CSS Conditional Rules Module Level 4 contains the features of CSS for conditional processing of parts of style sheets, conditioned on capabilities of the processor or the document the style sheet is being applied to. It includes and extends the functionality of CSS level 2 [CSS21], which builds on CSS level 1 [CSS1]. The main extensions compared to level 2 are allowing nesting of certain at-rules inside @media, and the addition of the @supports rule for conditional processing.

CSS is a language for describing the rendering of structured documents (such as HTML and XML) on screen, on paper, etc.