MDN & APG Integration

[lolaodelola]

Hi folks,

I'd like to add this to the agenda.

I've been in talks with Mozilla about what it'd look like to integrate APG patterns and examples into MDN and would love to feed that back to the group. The headliner is: Mozilla is happy to get this work started, as is Open Web Docs (the main non-Mozilla contributors to MDN) and apart from folks in the APG task force & Meta, I think they're our main stakeholders. Please do say if there's anyone else not involved in APG who should know about and contribute to this work.

However, there are some things to figure out, the current main blocker is where the content should live. The ideal scenario would be if we had a CMS that MDN & APG could consume so we'd only have to update the content in one place, however, I'm unsure of how feasible that is at the moment. MDN is currently going through a platform re-write to make it easier to manage and maintain. Another option, which is a quick win for now, is to copy the content over to MDN, Ruth John (Senior Manager of MDN) has mentioned that they'd be fine maintaining things on their end quite easily but it does add a tiny bit of overhead maintenance-wise.

I'm currently in the process for sourcing funding for this work as well.

[css-meeting-bot]

The ARIA Authoring Practices (APG) Task Force just discussed MDN integration.

The full IRC log of that discussion

<jugglinmike> Topic: MDN integration
<jugglinmike> github: https://github.com//issues/3098
<jugglinmike> Lola: While I was at Bocoup, this idea had been floated around from Boaz and some other colleagues
<jugglinmike> Lola: It had been de-prioritized in Bocoup's larger work, but now that I am working independently, I have the bandwidth to focus on this work
<jugglinmike> Lola: Last week, I met with Ruth John (sp?), the senior manager at MDN
<jugglinmike> Lola: She's very excited about the potential of this integration
<jugglinmike> Lola: MDN is currently undergoing a re-write of the platform
<jugglinmike> Lola: It may not effect the front-end, but the back-end is certainly changing
<jugglinmike> Lola: The main question right now is where the content should live
<jugglinmike> Lola: The ideal scenario would be to have a CMS that both MDN and APG could consume
<jugglinmike> Lola: However, I think that would take a lot of time and effort
<jugglinmike> Lola: I think Ruth is thinking about having a copy of what's happening in APG
<jugglinmike> Lola: Or completely moving the patterns from APG and maintaining them in MDN
<jugglinmike> Lola: Another thing to consider is that the ARIA-AT data (the data that says, e.g. that the "alert" pattern is compatible for JAWS in Chrome) is hosted from an iframe
<jugglinmike> Lola: We would probably have to think about making that an API instead so that it can be more efficiently consumed by MDN. Similar to the BCD project
<jugglinmike> Lola: At the moment, there is no funding for this work, but I am looking for funding, now
<jugglinmike> Lola: I've also spoken to Open Web Docs--the other contributors and maintainers of MDN
<jugglinmike> Lola: They are all gung-ho and excited for this work, as well
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I think we need to sit down and write some goals and vision
<jugglinmike> Lola: Agreed
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I don't think it would be good (from the perspective of serving our mission) to move anything outside of aria-practices
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: If we have to make changes to the structure of our content to make it more consumable, that would work
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I don't know if the right word here is to make it possible to "syndicate" the content, but conceptually, that's what I'm imagining
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: But again, that's where writing down the goals and the vision becomes very important because that shapes the conversation about solutions
<jugglinmike> Lola: It's possible that in the coming weeks, someone in Mozilla will join us here so they can give us context about the preferable solution
<jugglinmike> Lola: I have the sense that an API will fit in with their long-term vision for MDN
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: It would be amazing if, any time someone wanted to write about something in APG, they could just "suck in" specific examples to their content
<jugglinmike> Jem: I love working with MDN because that's the first place that developers usually go
<jugglinmike> Jem: I agree with Matt_King about the scope of this work. I'd much prefer to integrate/syndicate our work with MDN rather than relocate it
<jugglinmike> Lola: Matt_King, you had originally mentioned that you felt like this would take a number of years. Having heard a bit more, do you still feel that way?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Well, it depends on the approach we take. It sounds like you've already laid a fair amount of groundwork with a bunch of people
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Moving the APG from a "TR" to its own website--the startup part of it--took a long time
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: We had to align many stakeholders with different goals
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Addressing concerns related to the mission of the website, etc.
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Part of it is due to the speed of the W3C and how many people are spread across many people all at once
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I imagine that this could quite a bit quicker, especially if there was funding for someone to work on whatever coding needs to happen
<Jem> One thing to add is that there are more stakeholders other than MDN, APG and Meta. There are WAI, ARIA and other many stakeholders.
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Grant-seeking and contracting generally takes time, though. I think this might be done in the span of six months to a year, though
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I think the initial alignment on vision and getting things written down in a clear way will go a long way in helping us figure out what potential roadblocks might exist
<jugglinmike> Lola: Next week, I can bring a one-page document describing goals and stakeholders
<jugglinmike> Lola: I will send that document and this GitHub issue to Ruth
<Jem> john ruth
<Jem> Ruth John

[lolaodelola]

@mcking65 @a11ydoer This is the proposal I promised last week, for your viewing. @Rumyra this is an update to our conversation with a bit more information on what was discussed in the APG (minutes are also above for more detail).

[mcking65]

@lolaodelola

In addition to serving as a source of guidance for readers, the APG is also part of the ARIA development process. This is why we have added support for experimental examples.

Supporting the ARIA dimension of the Task Force mission is not compatible with concept 1 as presented. There would need to be some strong W3C component to the governance.

Another long term goal still on the table is harmonizing the WAI tutorials and potentially bringing the APG and tutorials closer together. Concept 1 would make that more difficult.

[lolaodelola]

@mcking65 That makes sense to me. Ruth won't be able to join us for today's meeting but hopefully concept 2 will be something MDN will be open to.

[css-meeting-bot]

The ARIA Authoring Practices (APG) Task Force just discussed MDN Proposal - next steps.

The full IRC log of that discussion

<jugglinmike> Topic: MDN Proposal - next steps
<jugglinmike> github: https://github.com//issues/3098
<jugglinmike> lola: I don't know if there's anything else to add here today because Matt_King has responded to the proposal
<jugglinmike> lola: My previous action item was to write the proposal
<jugglinmike> lola: I'm still waiting on Ruth's input. She just got back from leave, though, so she needs a little more time
<jugglinmike> lola: She's on UK time, so this meeting is a bit late for her, but I encouraged her to comment on this issue. Hopefully she'll be able to do that within the next couple of weeks
<jugglinmike> lola: TPAC is in two weeks, though, so we may revisit this after TPAC
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: My comment is consider how to streamline the proposal--how we would maintain the APG task force mission
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Is there anybody from the MDN stakeholders that will be present at TPAC?
<jugglinmike> lola: I can find out. I don't think that Ruth will be at TPAC, but perhaps some of her colleagues at MDN will
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: That could be a good forum for having a deeper discussion about these options and their tradeoffs
<jugglinmike> lola: Agreed, though I won't be attending TPAC this year
<jugglinmike> lola: We can try to figure out a separate meeting time with Ruth
<jugglinmike> lola: My understanding for the next phase is to follow up with Ruth next week and to schedule a meeting with the stakeholders
<jugglinmike> lola: Should I invite anyone else from this group?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Anyone who is interested. If we're discussing anything related to an API, then it could be useful for howard-e to be present because he designed something similar for the ARIA-AT project
<jugglinmike> howard-e: Sounds good
<jugglinmike> lola: I've spoken about this with Boaz and Chris at Bocoup. Chris wants to stay abreast, so howard-e can also help keep Chris in the loop
<jugglinmike> lola: Is there anyone else who would like to be involved?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: If we had an API in place to pull content from the APG and make that available for syndication for use in other places. Is there anything in W3.org or WAI--would they end up needing to be a stakeholder in what we do there
<jugglinmike> s/there/there?/
<jugglinmike> Daniel: I'm not sure. I can't think of any at the moment, but I need to double-check, so I'd like to stay in the loop about this.
<jugglinmike> Daniel: I'm in the central Europe time zone
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I was wondering if there might be any technical implications with respect to other sites. I assume it's not really different from any other kind of request hitting the website, but I don't know
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I suppose if they were going to be automated in some way (to pull in updates, for example), I wonder how that would work
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: There are no technical details in the proposal that Lola has posted as a GitHub issue, but it is still worth reading for you, Daniel
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Thank you very much, lola!
<jugglinmike> lola: Thanks, Matt_King

[css-meeting-bot]

The ARIA Authoring Practices (APG) Task Force just discussed MDN Proposal - next steps.

The full IRC log of that discussion

<jugglinmike> Topic: MDN Proposal - next steps
<jugglinmike> Lola: Ruth has gotten back to me. She read the proposal and the relevant GitHub issue
<jugglinmike> Lola: She said that the ideal way that W3C would share the content (via API) is unideal for MDN. They would prefer to manage the content however they want
<jugglinmike> Lola: Currently, any APIs they use currently is for data only--not for content. They're trying to avoid such dependencies for this rewrite
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I don't know anything about MDN's governance process (who the people are who control it, etc), and that's a big gap in my understanding
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: But we could have some kind of joint ownership agreement between W3C and MDN (where the actual editors of the APG content are members of both the W3C Task Force and MDN)
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: We have an arrangement like that with WHATWG
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: That seems like a massive shift, though. I have no idea whether it's worth exploring
<jugglinmike> Lola: I can speak to the governance of MDN. Mozilla is the entity to speak to about changes. However, Open Web Docs are also involved as key contributors and managers of some content (e.g. the Browser Compat Data)
<jugglinmike> Lola: Something like what you've proposed may not be definitely out of the question
<jugglinmike> Lola: However, does joint ownership still meet the W3C's requirements even if the content is hosted remotely?
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: If MDN has very strong editorial opinions that are in conflict with the needs of serving the needs of the web accessibility initiative, then that would be a problem
<jugglinmike> Lola: I think I'd like to discuss this more at TPAC, particularly because I think Daniel's input will be valuable and because he's not present today
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Yeah. I would hate to halt this investigation without even just one exploratory conversation
<jugglinmike> Lola: The content on MDN is open source, so anyone can realistically contribute. I've contributed tutorials to MDN, and I've been involved in the decision-making process about which documents get renewed. That conversation happens in Open Web Docs
<jugglinmike> Lola: They have mainly contributed to MDN, but there's nothing to stop them from wanting to contribute to APG or elsewhere
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: If there are some resources that we should read, then maybe put them in this issue
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: That could help us be more informed and understand what the options are
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: We've made a huge investment about building the APG within W3C, so if it were to move, that would be a big deal
<jugglinmike> Jem: I'm looking at the proposal, and I'm kind of shocked that "the APG Task Force would lose ownership of the APG"
<jugglinmike> Jem: That text is from the "concept 1" section of the document
<jugglinmike> Lola: If MDN is consuming some content through an API, that makes it difficult to maintain that content should they need to
<jugglinmike> Jem: That sounds more like a technical issue and less like a governance issue
<jugglinmike> Lola: A lot of this is coming up now because they are re-writing the whole platform. I don't know if this is actually being raised as a governance issue. It's more that, in thinking about the change to the platform, they are removing third-party dependencies. So they don't want to introduce a new dependency just as they are removing the existing ones
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: I would rather have an exploratory conversation before "killing" the idea
<jugglinmike> Jem: I just want to make sure everyone comes to the conversation with a collaborative spirit
<jugglinmike> Matt_King: Thank you very much, Lola!
<jugglinmike> github: https://github.com//issues/3098

[iadawn]

Hi, just catching up on this as Daniel flagged it for my attention. Interesting idea. From W3C perspective we would need to consider copyright and attribution. We have a pretty permissive model for using WAI materials. The main two points are:

1. Clearly attribute the original source as specified below, and
2. Not modify the content (with few exceptions noted below).

I would be keen to be kept abreast of this discussion.

Thanks

Kevin

FYI @shawna-slh

[lolaodelola]

Thank you @iadawn.

@mcking65 @a11ydoer @daniel-montalvo Just for your info on Open Web Docs, the proposal has information on who they are and their relevance to the project but I think their 2023 impact report gives more detail on the exact work they do.