Deprecate <accronym> (was: Brainstorming - abbreviations)

Dan Connolly wrote:
 > If there's a specific proposal somebody has about abbreviations,
 > it would help me if they would say how it interacts
 > with the examples that Bill gave. It might be worth starting
 > a new thread, as this one is getting worn out.
 >
 > e.g. if somebody is proposing to get rid <abbr />,
 > that suggest that validating/checking tools should
 > give a thumbs-down to
 > 
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html/2007JanMar/att-0325/abbr_en-us_fr_title.html
 >

Alright.

Two elements aren't needed. The semantic distinctions between abbr and 
acronym are murky at best.

I've learned in the past week that the reason screen readers don't 
expand marked-up abbreviations by default is that they (screen readers) 
don't trust HTML authors to understand the need of users of screen 
readers. (This is the same reason they don't support aural css).

These elements are really only useful to super-conscientious authors who 
are trying to be helpful to their readers. There is absolutely no need 
whatever to distinguish between acronyms and abbreviations for these uses.

So why kill acronym and not abbr? Semantically, abbreviation is the 
broader category. Not every acronym is an abbreviation.

All that said, I'm strongly in favor of tabling this discussion 
completely until we've made more progress on larger, more important issues.

-Colin Lieberman

Received on Friday, 23 March 2007 04:41:20 UTC