RE: alt text & punctuation - best practice?

Ian,

With my tech author's hat on, I was very interested to read your comment on
adding punctuation to headings: were you talking only in the context of alt
texts on graphics used casually as headings, or do you mean *all* headings -
including those properly marked up with h1/h2 tags etc? I am not clear on
the difference in the 'aural punctuation' of a spoken alt text on an item
tagged as h1, and a straight text h1, for example.

If punctuation even on properly tagged headings (graphic or text) would be
helpful in accessibility terms, it requires a rather dramatic shift in
authoring practice, as you hinted. Although colons are sometimes used in the
context of headings (especially in typewritten texts where elegant font
distinctions are not available), full stops almost never are. (As I am sure
you have noticed, colons are more commonly used to introduce lists,
examples, or related paras, rather than whole sections of a document.)

Lois Wakeman

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http://lois.co.uk
http://siteusability.com
http://communicationarts.co.uk

Received on Monday, 21 June 2004 07:27:14 UTC