RE: Getting beyond the ping pong match (was RE: Cleaning House)

Mark Birbeck wrote:
> 
> But secondly, I would say that using @class rather than the role
> attribute to carry values that are about the structure of a document,
> could appear to be an example of the 'not invented here' mindset. I'm
> sure it's not, but I would urge people to consider @role for this
> task, since:    
> 
>   * @role was created specifically to allow authors to say what an
>     element's purpose is; 
> 
>   * it was further motivated by trying to provide an 'unpolluted'
>      value space so that there would be no ambiguities;
> 
>   * it is available as a standalone module that can be used in
>     different mark-up languages;
> 
>   * it has been added to Firefox already.
> 

!!! Thank you Mark!!!

I might also suggest that @role is endorsed and supported by the Mozilla
Foundation, that the ARIA Suite (which is leaning on @role to achieve it's
goals) is funded in part by the good folks at IBM, and emerging as
significant in the accessibility of AJAX technologies, and it's built-in
ability to scale out via RDF is exactly what the semantic proponents are
suggesting we need.

New Question: given that @role *is* an important part of Accessible Rich
Internet Applications (or at least emerging as such), if HTML 5 *does not*
support @role, what then of this work, and of accessibility?  Or are we
stepping backwards here too?

JF

JF

Received on Monday, 7 May 2007 15:17:17 UTC