WCAG 2 style guide

Any updates to WCAG guidance should follow the WAI Style Guide and W3C Manual of Style, which specifies Merriam-Webster's online dictionary as the primary source for spelling, and the Chicago Manual of Style as the arbiter of style (online subscription necessary, but pick up a used copy in used bookstores anywhere).

For commonly used constructs not covered in the WAI guide, the following style and word usage guides have been started. These should be considered draft; they have not been vetted or adopted. However, they follow the most established conventions currently used in documents.

Style

Figures and illustrations

In figure captions and references, spell out the word figure, numbering illustrations sequentially within the document. Separate the figure number from the captions only by a space, then capitaliz the first word of the caption. Captions are generally written as sentences with terminating punctuation. Do not use a period if the caption is only a sentence fragment.

Example

Figure 4 A customized checkbox with light grey check (#E5E5E5), which has a contrast ratio of 5.6:1 with the purple box (#6221EA).

References

Links to definitions

If there is a definition, simply enclose the definition term in anchor tags and it will be properly formed on publish, e.g., <a>web page</a>

See https://github.com/w3c/wcag#definitions for more details.

Word usage

Since the terms section of the W3C guide is sparse, WCAG-specific word usage is being begun here.

S

success criterion, success criteria

Both the singular and plural terms should only be used capitalized in combination with the number of a success criterion, which frequently occurs as part of a link name (e.g., "Refer to Success Criterion 2.2.1"). Where either term stands along (without the number), use lower case (e.g., "This success criterion is...")

W

web

lowercase except if proper noun meaning World Wide Web

website, but web page