Re: Notice of impending Formal Objection to Issue 30 Decision (@longdesc)

Hi again,

On 2010-08-13, at 12:17 AM, John Foliot wrote:

> Which begs another question: what 'penalty' will authors encounter if they
> continue to use @longdesc in their HTML5 documents? If the answer is none
> (save the inability to display a non-existent "conformance badge"), then I
> know what I will continue to advocate and teach (users over authors,
> authors over implementers, implementers over technical purity). 

I feel the exact same way.

As someone who is in charge of offering accessibility training and consulting services to the large majority of government employees in the province of Quebec, I will definitely continue to advocate for @longdesc even if HTML5 rules it out.

I've been a faithful promoter of compliancy and valid code for the past 10 years, but if I have to throw that aside in order to ensure end users can still benefit from a relevant accessibility feature, then so be it. 

I'm pretty sure I will not be the only one and at the end of the day, I can live with an HTML error such as this one.

I think what we've done with HTML5 is great. I think the language is definitely worth using. But I can learn to live with one page not validating once in a while if it means providing a much needed structured description to an otherwise non-textual complex content.

Users over authors, authors over implementers, implementers over technical purity. So totally true.

That, my friends, is real pragmatism.

--
Denis Boudreau
http://www.twitter.com/dboudreau

Received on Friday, 13 August 2010 14:39:48 UTC