Re: empty alternatives?

I think it is very important to give authors the opportunity to be
constructive. We (IBM) advocate (http://www.austin.ibm.com/sns/guidelines)
the use of alt="" for images that are redundant or unimportant.

Jim Thatcher
IBM Special Needs Systems
www.ibm.com/sns
HPR Documentation page: http://www.austin.ibm.com/sns/hprdoc.html
thatch@us.ibm.com
(512)838-0432


David Poehlman <poehlman@clark.net> on 11/15/99 05:24:51 PM

To:   Jon Gunderson <jongund@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu>, WAI User Agent Working
      Group <w3c-wai-ua@w3.org>
cc:
Subject:  Re: empty alternatives?




yes, but that leaves a hole in access where by the person browsing
with images not loading or using a screen reader misses the
opportunity to gain the information that the image provides.  We have
repair techniques for other processes such as table mark up and the
ability to choose to have the url rendered would be a boon for user
configuragility.  I'd put it at p3 but still for those that need or
want it it might bee good to consider it.  I'm looking at this from
the perspectave of seeing a page with nothing but images on it that do
not have alternative text associated and no other words or elements on
the page.  Looks blank to me especially since I'm browsing with images
off?

It just feels strange when I see render nothing here.
Thanks!


Jon Gunderson wrote:
>
> David,
> An image with no alt text should have information rendered that there is
an
> image present.
> An image with empty ALT text (ALT="") should be suppressed.  This is my
> understanding of WCAG guidelines recommendation.
> Jon
>
> At 04:40 PM 11/15/99 -0500, David Poehlman wrote:
> >I review currently the nov 5 draft and each time I do from the first,
> >I get a queasy feeling about empty alternatives.  I understand on the
> >one hand why and agree with the sentament that the word image repeated
> ><50 11> times is pretty obnoxious.  Consider for a monemt though that
> >an image that has no alt text is one that is downloadable or is
> >desired to be.  if Nothing is rendered, it cannot be found by a screen
> >reader but through digging out the source assuming one knows that it
> >is there in the first place.  Can we then have a ttoggle for this?  so
> >that we can have either the url or nothing rendered?
> >Thanks!
> >--
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> >---sig off---
>
> Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
> Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
> Chair, W3C WAI User Agent Working Group
> Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
> College of Applied Life Studies
> University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
> 1207 S. Oak Street, Champaign, IL  61820
>
> Voice: (217) 244-5870
> Fax: (217) 333-0248
>
> E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu
>
> WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
> WWW: http://www.w3.org/wai/ua

--
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Touching The Internet:
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Voice: 301.949.7599
ftp://ftp.clark.net/pub/poehlman
http://poehlman.clark.net
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---sig off---

Received on Monday, 15 November 1999 19:15:29 UTC