Re: minutes: HTML WG Weekly 21 May 2009 [draft]

Hi Anne,

> I searched the mailing list for summary and cowpath/cow path and couldn't
> find any email where someone said the reason summary has not been included
> is the result of paving a cowpath.

There are a couple of ancillary explicit references in the html-public
archive regarding table summary and cowpaths. But are absolutely
right, Anne, cowpaths were referred to more implicitly in that
specific accessibility debate. People haven’t said "cowpaths" that
much out loud in that debate but they have said repeatedly that pretty
much all screen readers support @summary [1], including older versions
which they said means there is already an audience of assistive
technology users out there who can use it, today.

The cowpath principle has been argued more explicitly in other debates
but implicitly it is usually always there.

> I think one of the primary arguments was that summary would do more harm
> than good because it is so often used incorrectly.

Those are two of the arguments why summary should not be provided.
Points #4 and #8 in the Wiki try to say that [2]. Should they be
phrased differently? Did I miss any other rationale for that side of
the argument?

Rationale for why a table summary mechanism should be provided in
HTML5 is also in the Wiki [3].

> Multiple independent surveys of Web content found this.

Those are also listed in the Wiki [3]. Did I miss any?

Thanks.

Best Regards,
Laura

[1] http://esw.w3.org/topic/HTML/SummaryForTABLE#head-efb5f42844e374dbc45ffe4dadd74ea8a29d54bf
[2] http://esw.w3.org/topic/HTML/SummaryForTABLE#head-2046cf917919f6d17e0ee7990238686702c17523
[3] http://esw.w3.org/topic/HTML/SummaryForTABLE#head-222af24a2b1dcdc3afe5e3036551b70f99cf232c
[4] http://esw.w3.org/topic/HTML/SummaryForTABLE#head-46654c194f99ed943eb26573a6506818962826ee
-- 
Laura L. Carlson

Received on Wednesday, 27 May 2009 14:24:17 UTC