The Internet changes, and so do the Web Guidelines

The Internet changes all the time. Websites become more and more interactive and offer the visitor increasingly rich experiences. Using new techniques without loss of quality and accessibility is a challenge. Internationally, this has resulted in a new accessibility standard: WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) 2.0. The Web Guidelines need to be renewed as well – a work currently in progress.

Renewal of the Web Guidelines

By now, the Web Guidelines are five years old. In those years, a lot has changed on the Internet. Moreover, a new international accessibility standard has been issued by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the international organisation that develops web standards for the Internet. This new accessibility standard is called WCAG 2.0. The current version of the Web Guidelines is based on its predecessor, WCAG 1.0. The issue of this new standard was the main reason to start revising the Web Guidelines now. Apart from the new accessibility standards, insights that have arisen through the years can be directly incorporated in the Web Guidelines as well.

Official assignment

At the beginning of March 2010, the Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations, together with the Quality mark drempelvrij.nl Foundation, officially commissioned the revision of the Web Guidelines.

The aforementioned accessibility guidelines (WCAG) form part of the Web Guidelines. The other part of the Web Guidelines deals with quality and general principles for building websites. In the new version of the Web Guidelines, the part that was first based on WCAG 1.0 will be replaced by WCAG 2.0. The part relating to quality and general principles will not be expanded with new guidelines, but it will be better structured, described more clearly and updated.

A working group consisting of experts in the field is currently working on this assignment. In 2010, the revision will be extensively reviewed by a broad stakeholder group: people who are professionally involved with the Web Guidelines.

Transitional period

The establishment of the new Web Guidelines (scheduled for the end of 2010) will be followed by a transitional period that ties in with the usual substitution period for websites. For governments and other organisations this means they can proceed with adjusting their websites on the basis of the current Web Guidelines. As a results they will not experience any bottlenecks. Since the new Web Guidelines largely coincide with the current ones, organisations can start implementing the current Web Guidelines without risking any complications. This will make the transition to the revised Web Guidelines at a later stage a lot easier. By then, they will have done the 'hard work'.