Re: Issues of @summary and use of data for "decisions"

On 2009-06-23 Simon Pieters <simonp@opera.com> wrote:

>On Wed, 24 Jun 2009 01:12:40 +0200, Steve Axthelm <steveax@pobox.com> wrote:
>
>>On 2009-06-23 Simon Pieters <simonp@opera.com> wrote:
>>
>>>How about the following statement?
>>>
>>><caption> is read automatically when the table is encountered.
>>>summary="" is read only on user request.
>>
>>That's entirely dependent upon the combination of browser/AT/user
>>settings (if any).
>>
>>With default settings, Jaws 10 reads summary automatically with both
>>IE7 and FF3. I believe Window Eyes does the same but I'd have to
>>test. Not sure about other AT.
>
>Thanks.
>
>If this is the case, then it seems to me that the user agent does not
>need to be able to distinguish between caption and summary, and thus
><caption> can be used for both purposes.

I disagree. Rolling summary into caption reduces options for 
both page authors and for users of AT. As a developer, perhaps a 
developer who knows the preferences of users of AT that frequent 
my site, having summary separate from caption gives me 
flexibility in the way I present information about tables. I 
would submit that AT users also benefit from having them 
separate as it affords them more granularity in user settings.

Regards,


-Steve

-- 
Steve Axthelm
steveax@pobox.com