RE: a few suggestions on marking up comments [WAS Is the current definition of the article element in HTML useful?]

Steve Faulkner wrote:

“I have sketched out a few possibilities:
1 conservative, 1 less so.

http://www.html5accessibility.com/tests/comments.html”

 

The conservative option probably makes the most sense. It’s familiar
territory for developers, a comment thread is a collection of items, and it
also provides another way for AT users to discover the number of items in
the collection.

 

Having something like:

 

<h2>38 comments</h2>

 

Makes that information easily discoverable visually (and that’s a good
thing), but it’s possible a screen reader user would bypass the heading (if
they were navigating the page by list for example). By wrapping the comment
thread in a list, for example:

 

<h2>38 comments</h2>

<ul>

<li>Comment 1</li>

<li>Comment 2</li>

…

<li>Comment 38</li>

</ul>

 

A screen reader would also be told “List of 38 items” on arriving at the top
of the list. Belt and braces is often a good thing.

 

I agree with Ian’s point that an ordered list might sometimes make sense,
unless comments were deliberately jumbled of course.

 

Léonie.

 

From: Steve Faulkner [mailto:faulkner.steve@gmail.com] 
Sent: 25 January 2013 11:38
To: HTMLWG WG
Subject: a few suggestions on marking up comments [WAS Is the current
definition of the article element in HTML useful?]

 

I have sketched out a few possibilities:
1 conservative, 1 less so.

http://www.html5accessibility.com/tests/comments.html


regards
SteveF



On 23 January 2013 10:41, Steve Faulkner <faulkner.steve@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi all,

I think the definition of the article element in HTML [1] is overly
vague and broad, which leads to intended and unintended use that
undermines its usefulness as a semantic construct for users that
actually consume its semantics such as screen reader users.

For example, the spec promotes the use of article as a container of,
well, an article and also for each instance of a comment on an article
(example: [2]).
Yet there is no defined method of exposing the semantic differences
between an article in the common understanding of the term and when
used as defined in the broader HTML definition.

I suggest that the authoring advice and requirments in regards to the
article element need to be reviewed and perhaps modified in light of
usage data [4], how the semantics are exposed and conveyed in user
agents, issues articulated in articles and blog posts (example: [3])
on how to use it and feedback from users and developers.



[1]http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/sections.html#the-article-el
ement
[2]
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/07/tories-laughing-again-de
borah-orr
[3] http://html5doctor.com/designing-a-blog-with-html5/
[4] http://www.html5accessibility.com/HTML5data/article/
--
with regards

Steve Faulkner




-- 
with regards

Steve Faulkner
Technical Director - TPG

www.paciellogroup.com | www.HTML5accessibility.com |
www.twitter.com/stevefaulkner
HTML5: Techniques for providing useful text alternatives -
dev.w3.org/html5/alt-techniques/
Web Accessibility Toolbar -
www.paciellogroup.com/resources/wat-ie-about.html
<http://www.paciellogroup.com/resources/wat-ie-about.html>