W3C

The Web Authentication Working Group Patent Advisory Group (PAG), launched in October 2016, has published a report recommending that W3C continue work on the Web Authentication Specification. W3C launches a PAG to resolve issues in the event a patent has been disclosed that may be essential, but is not available under the W3C Royalty-Free licensing terms.

The Browser Testing and Tools Working Group invites implementation of the Candidate Recommendation of WebDriver. WebDriver is a remote control interface that enables introspection and control of user agents. It provides a platform and language-neutral wire protocol as a way for out-of-process programs to remotely instruct the behavior of web browsers as well as a set of interfaces to discover and manipulate DOM elements in web documents and to control the behavior of a user agent. It is primarily intended to allow web authors to write tests that automate a user agent from a separate controlling process, but may also be used in such a way as to allow in-browser scripts to control a possibly separate browser.

The Spatial Data on the Web Working Group has published a Group Note of Spatial Data on the Web Best Practices. This document advises on best practices related to the publication and usage of spatial data on the Web; the use of Web technologies as they may be applied to location. The best practices are intended for practitioners, including Web developers and geospatial experts, and are compiled based on evidence of real-world application. These best practices suggest a significant change of emphasis from traditional Spatial Data Infrastructures by adopting a Linked Data approach. As location is often the common factor across multiple datasets, spatial data is an especially useful addition to the Linked Data cloud; the 5 Stars of Linked Data paradigm is promoted where relevant.

The Web Performance Working Group invites implementation of the Candidate Recommendation of Resource Timing Level 1. This specification defines an interface for web applications to access the complete timing information for resources in a document. User latency is an important quality benchmark for Web Applications. While JavaScript-based mechanisms can provide comprehensive instrumentation for user latency measurements within an application, in many cases, they are unable to provide a complete end-to-end latency picture. This document introduces the PerformanceResourceTiming interface to allow JavaScript mechanisms to collect complete timing information related to resources on a document. Navigation Timing 2 extends this specification to provide additional timing information associated with a navigation.

The Web Performance Working Group invites implementation of the Candidate Recommendation of Page Visibility Level 2. This specification defines a means to programmatically determine the visibility state of a document. This can aid in the development of resource efficient web applications.

The HTML Media Extensions Working Group has published a Proposed Recommendation of Encrypted Media Extensions. The specification extends HTMLMediaElement to define a common API to control playback of protected content. EME does not define a content protection or Digital Rights Management system. The common API may be used to discover, select and interact with such systems as well as with simpler content encryption systems. Comments are welcome through 13 April. Please, read more in the public announcement.