Re: Moving longdesc forward

Laura Carlson, Tue, 3 May 2011 07:26:33 -0500:
> The latest longdesc spec text is at:
> http://www.d.umn.edu/~lcarlson/research/ld-spec-text2.html

> Many thanks to Benjamin for this. Does anyone have suggestions to
> improve that spec text verbiage? I am wondering if  we should add the
> words "in a device independent manner" to the end of the sentence
> "User agents should allow users to access long text alternatives."
> Thoughts?

NOTE 1: Should the spect text say 'URL' rather than 'link'? 'link' 
brings the thought to HTML5's definition of 'interactive elements', 
which @longdesc has nothing to do with.

NOTE 2: The suggested spec text only says this, about fragment URLs:

  ]]  The link must point to either a different document from the image 
or a fragment of the same document that does not contain the image.  [[

I would suggest to add that when the description is located in a 
document which contains more than the description itself (NOTE: this is 
includes if the fragment is on the same page!), then the longdesc MUST 
point to the #fragment which encapsulates the entire description or 
which at least identifies the start of the description. It should also 
always be simple to know, via the right choice of markup e.g. a heading 
or article or aside element etc, when the description begins and ends.

So, after the sentence (or after the paragraph) mentioned above, how 
about adding this:

  ]]  A description SHOULD have a clear beginning and a clear end. When 
the URL points to a page that contains more than the particular 
description (NOTE: this includes cases where the description is located 
in the same document as the image), the URL MUST identify the fragment 
where the description begins (this fragment SHOULD be the container for 
entire description).  [[ 

> Last weekend I worked on User Agent rendering longdesc spec text based
> on text Benjamin supplied. That draft is at:
> http://www.d.umn.edu/~lcarlson/research/ld-rendering.html

> Does anyone have suggestions to improve it? Ideas for improving
> verbiage, images, or the longdescs on the images themselves are all
> welcome. Chaals, the first example is based on tellmemore. Is it okay?

NOTE 3: Nice that all of those images have @longdesc! How did I know? 
Because the cursor tells me so. Thus I suggest mentioning cursor as 
well. It would be relevant to mention this together with the third 
example, where you speak about 'context menu'. A context menu is easily 
overlooked unless there is a cursor which hints that it would be useful 
to look at the context menu. I have sent some cursor images here and 
there which perhaps can be used: 

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2011Apr/att-0134/icab-longdesc-implementation

-- 
Leif H Silli

Received on Tuesday, 3 May 2011 16:05:58 UTC