Md. Code Regs. 14.33.01.02

Current through Register Vol. 51, No. 24, December 2, 2024

Section 14.33.01.02 - Definitions

A. In this subtitle, the following terms have the meanings indicated.

B. Terms Defined

(1) "Accessible" means:

(a) Easy to get to;

(b) Approachable; or

(c) Available.

(2) "Agency" means each unit of State government to which this subtitle is applicable in accordance with State Finance and Procurement Article, § 3A -302, Annotated Code of Maryland, and Regulation .01 of this chapter.

(3) "Application" means software designed to perform, or to help the user to perform, a specific task or tasks.

(4) "Assistive technology (AT)" means any item, piece of equipment, or product system, whether acquired commercially, modified, or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, or improve functional capabilities of individuals with disabilities.

(5) "Audio description", "video description", or "descriptive narration" means narration added to a soundtrack, usually during existing pauses in dialogue, to:

(a) Describe important visual details that cannot be understood from the main soundtrack alone;

(b) Inform individuals who are blind or who have low vision about visual content essential for comprehension;

(c) Provide information about actions, characters, scene changes, on-screen text, and other visual content; and

(d) Supplement the regular audio track of a program.

(6) "Authoring tool" means any software, or collection of software components, that can be used by authors, alone or collaboratively, to create or modify content for use by others, including other authors.

(7) Closed Functionality.

(a) "Closed functionality" means characteristics that limit functionality or prevent a user from attaching or installing assistive technology.

(b) "Closed functionality" includes self-service machines, information kiosks, set-top boxes, fax machines, calculators, and computers that are locked down so that users may not adjust settings due to a policy such as desktop core configuration.

(8) "Content" means electronic information and data, as well as the encoding that defines its structure, presentation, and interactions.

(9) "Department" means the Department of Information Technology.

(10) Document.

(a) "Document" means a logically distinct assembly of content (such as a file, set of files, or streamed media) that: Functions as a single entity rather than a collection; is not part of software; and does not include its own software to retrieve and present content for users.

(b) "Document" includes, but is not limited to, letters, email messages, spreadsheets, presentations, podcasts, images, and movies.

(11) Equivalent.

(a) "Equivalent" means fulfilling essentially the same function or purpose upon presentation to a user.

(b) "Equivalent" fulfills essentially the same function for a person with a disability utilizing reasonable accommodations to the extent possible, given the nature of the disability and the state of technology, as the primary content does for the person without a disability.

(12) "Existing ICT" means ICT that was procured, maintained, or used on or before January 18, 2018.

(13) "Hardware" means a tangible device, equipment, or a physical component of nonvisual ICT, such as telephones, computers, multifunction copy machines, and keyboards.

(14) "Information technology" has the meaning set forth in 40 U.S.C. 11101(6).

(15) Information and Communication Technology (ICT).

(a) "Information and communication technology (ICT)" means information technology and other equipment, systems, technologies, or processes for which the principal function is the creation, manipulation, storage, display, receipt, or transmission of electronic data and information, as well as any associated content.

(b) "Information and communication technology (ICT)" includes, but is not limited to:

(i) Computers and peripheral equipment;

(ii) Information kiosks and transaction machines;

(iii) Telecommunications equipment;

(iv) Customer premises equipment;

(v) Multifunction office machines;

(vi) Software;

(vii) Applications;

(viii) Websites;

(ix) Videos; and

(x) Electronic documents.

(16) Keyboard.

(a) "Keyboard" means a set of systematically arranged alphanumeric keys or a control that generates alphanumeric input by which a machine or device is operated.

(b) "Keyboard" includes tactilely discernible keys used in conjunction with the alphanumeric keys if their function maps to keys on the keyboard interfaces.

(17) "Label" means text, or a component with a text alternative, that is presented to a user to identify content. A label is presented to all users, whereas a name may be hidden and only exposed by assistive technology. In many cases, the name and the label are the same.

(18) "Name" means text by which software can identify a component to the user. A name may be hidden and only exposed by assistive technology, whereas a label is presented to all users. In many cases, the label and the name are the same. Name is unrelated to the name attribute in HTML.

(19) "Nonweb software" means software that is not:

(a) A webpage;

(b) Embedded in a webpage; and

(c) Used in the rendering or functioning of webpages.

(20) "Nonvisual access" means the ability, through keyboard control, synthesized speech, braille, or other methods not requiring sight, to receive, use, and manipulate information, and operate controls necessary to access information technology.

(21) "Operable part" means the hardware-based user controls for activating, deactivating, or adjusting ICT.

(22) "Platform accessibility services" means the services provided by a platform enabling interoperability with assistive technology, including application programming interfaces (API) and the document object model (DOM).

(23) Platform Software.

(a) "Platform Software" means software that:

(i) Interacts with hardware or provides services for other software;

(ii) May run or host other software;

(iii) May isolate the other software from underlying software or hardware layers; and

(iv) May have both platform and nonplatform aspects.

(b) "Platform software" includes:

(i) Desktop operating systems;

(ii) Embedded operating systems, including mobile systems;

(iii) Web browsers;

(iv) Plug-ins to web browsers that render a particular media or format; and

(v) Sets of components that allow other applications to execute, such as applications which support macros or scripting.

(24) "Programmatically determinable" means the ability to be determined by software from author-supplied data that is provided in a way that different user agents, including assistive technologies, can extract and present the information to users in different modalities.

(25) "Public facing" means the content made available by an agency to members of the general public, including, but not limited to, an agency web site, blog post, or social media page.

(26) "Software" means programs, procedures, rules, and related data and documentation that direct the use and operation of ICT and instruct it to perform a given task or function, including, but not limited to, applications, non-web software, and platform software.

(27) Software Tool.

(a) "Software tool" means software:

(i) For which the primary function is the development of other software;

(ii) That usually comes in the form of an integrated development environment (IDE); and

(iii) Is a suite of related products and utilities.

(b) "Software tool" includes Microsoft® Visual Studio®, Apple® Xcode®, and Eclipse Foundation Eclipse®.

(28) "Telecommunications" means the signal transmission, between or among points specified by the user, of information of the user's choosing, without change in the form or content of the information as sent and received.

(29) "Terminal" means a device or software with which the end user directly interacts and that provides the user interface, including software that provides the user interface on more than one device such as a telephone and a server.

(30) "Text" means a sequence of characters that can be programmatically determined and that expresses something in human language.

(31) "Voice over Internet protocol (VoIP)" means technology that provides real-time voice communications and requires a broadband connection from the user's location and customer premises equipment compatible with Internet protocol.

(32) "Webpage" means a nonembedded resource obtained from a single universal resource identifier (URI) using hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP), plus any other resources that are provided for the rendering, retrieval, and presentation of content.

Md. Code Regs. 14.33.01.02

Regulation .02B amended effective April 5, 2010 (37:7 Md. R. 575); amended effective 49:5 Md. R. 366, eff. 3/7/2022