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This is an early unpublished editor's draft; content is incomplete and subject to change.

Consistent structural order

supplemental

Normative Text

The relative order of structural components remains consistent throughout each variation of pages/views in the conformance scope.

Applies when

Relative order means that content can be added or removed, but repeated items are in the same order relative to each other.

Tests

This section is non-normative.

Consistent relative order for website

Procedure

For each variation of pages/views in the conformance scope:

  1. Identify common structural components across multiple pages/views.
  2. Check that components are presented in the same order within each page/view.

Expected results

  • #2 is true.

Tests

This content needs to be written.

Key Terms

actively available

available for the user to perceive and use

component

grouping of elements for a distinct function

conformance scope

A set of Views and/or Pages selected to be part of a conformance claim. Where a View or Page is part of a Process, all the Views or Pages in the process must be included.

How a person or organization selects the set is not defined in WCAG3. There maybe informative guidance on selecting a suitable set in future (similar to WCAG-EM), but regional laws or regulations may provide a methodology.

content

information, sensory experience and interactions conveyed

page

non-embedded resource obtained from a single URI using HTTP plus any other resources that are used in the rendering or intended to be rendered together

Where a URI is available and represents a unique set of content, that would be the preferred conformance unit.

platform

software, or collection of layers of software, that lies below the subject software and provides services to the subject software and that allows the subject software to be isolated from the hardware, drivers, and other software below

Platform software both makes it easier for subject software to run on different hardware, and provides the subject software with many services (e.g. functions, utilities, libraries) that make the subject software easier to write, keep updated, and work more uniformly with other subject software.

A particular software component might play the role of a platform in some situations and a client in others. For example a browser is a platform for the content of the page but it also relies on the operating system below it.

The platform is the context in which the conformance scope exists.

process

series of views or pages associated with user actions, where actions required to complete an activity are performed, often in a certain order, regardless of the technologies used or whether it spans different sites or domains

structural component

a component that provides the same organizational or navigational purpose across multiple pages/views pages/views

view

content that is actively available in a viewport including that which can be scrolled or panned to, and any additional content that is included by expansion while leaving the rest of the content in the viewport actively available

A modal dialog box would constitute a new view because the other content in the viewport is no longer actively available.

viewport

object in which the platform presents content

The author has no control of the viewport and almost always has no idea what is presented in a viewport (e.g. what is on screen) because it is provided by the platform. On browsers the hardware platform is isolated from the content.

Content can be presented through one or more viewports. Viewports include windows, frames, loudspeakers, and virtual magnifying glasses. A viewport may contain another viewport. For example, nested frames. Interface components created by the user agent such as prompts, menus, and alerts are not viewports.