Re: Action: Proposal for HTML Access

How is Murray's submission related to the WAI process and the various
relevant action items which the WAI working group has been considering for
the past few months? I thought there was intended to be a WAI results page
established that would act as a means of communicating proposals and
recommendations to the various W3C working groups, including the HTML WG.
I admit to being somewhat confused as to how Murray's action item is
integrated into ongoing WAI activities and the development of mechanisms
whereby the WAI can influence the development of W3C standards.
Incidentally, I would have expected the internal W3C procedures for
dealing with WAI recommendations to have been established right from the
outset of the project, as part of the W3C commitment to ensuring that its
standards enable web technologies and resources to be fully accessible.

Turning briefly to the specific proposals which Murray has mentioned, it
is clear that most of them have been discussed in detail on this mailing
list. Daniel Dardailler, Al Gilman and I have strongly and consistently
argued for the inclusion of image maps within the definition of the OBJECT
element. The question of whether ALT should be a required attribute of the
IMG element still appears to be controversial, as is the related issue of
whether an empty ALT string would be acceptable, even desirable, in
certain circumstances. I am surprised that Murray is suggesting that
LONGDESC should be associated with OBJECT. Rather, I understood that it
was intended to be an attribute of IMG. If I recall the HTML 4.0 draft
correctly, it effectively prescribes that the innermost OBJECT in a nested
series of OBJECT elements contain a textual description or label of the
resource to which reference is being made. Thus, the long description can
be incorporated within OBJECT (given that it is a block level element) and
there appears to be no need for a separate LONGDESC element or attribute.
The contents of OBJECT are displayed whenever the user agent is unable to
present the resource in question, or, presumably, in circumstances where
the user has opted not to display images, etc.

Received on Wednesday, 27 August 1997 00:14:18 UTC