lend scope to Headers with @aaa:labelledby ??

** Preface

In part this relates to the issue about merging nesting levels with 
header levels:

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/wai-xtech/2007May/thread.html#msg10

In the past I once alluded to a technique that one could use with the HTML
header markup to give a machine-understandable indication of exactly what
content the header heads or labels.

In that conversation, I mentioned using a <div> but any container will do if
there is a container that is the right scope.

** Example:

<div aaa:labelledby="#h3-13">
<h3 id="h3-13">subsection heading</h3>
<p> foo </p>
<!-- more content -->
</div>

This is a technique that I would recommend to authors that want to take
advantage of WAI-ARIA markup.  It makes the structure of their pages
implement the spirit of XAG 2.5 to "provide a complete containment structure."

** Request for Comment

When I raised this the first time, it was treated as a radical, new idea.  So
please review and comment this as a proposed part of our Best Practice
document for authors.

** Discussion

This is my version of how to rescue what ISO HTML tried to do about scoping
for those sections of the page that the author has already recognized they
want to label with headers.  It doesn't demand exhaustive coverage, but it
does provide a way for the author to make clear when a section is followed
by a filler, and avoid other problems revolving around confusing as to what
is under what heading.

Al

Received on Sunday, 20 May 2007 17:53:55 UTC