Re: Technique H45 procedure description incomplete

On Wed, Nov 12, 2008 at 9:20 PM, Dylan Nicholson <d.nicholson@hisoftware.com
> wrote:

>  H45 is described as
>
>  Procedure
>
>    1.
>
>    Check that a longdesc attribute exists.
>    2.
>
>    Check that the link in the longdesc attribute is valid
>    3.
>
>    Check that the long description describes the original non-text content
>    associated with it.
>
>  Expected Results
>
>    -
>
>    #1 through #3 are all true
>
> But a) it doesn't explain on what elements we are to check for the longdesc
> attribute - presumably it should be IMG elements only in this case, and not
> FRAMES and IFRAMEs
>
> b) surely it's not implying that to pass H45 every element that supports
> longdesc attributes must in fact do so??  That would cause virtually every
> page on the web to fail immediately, as I don't think I've ever seen a
> commercial site using LONGDESC - at least, not correctly.
>
> c) what is meant by valid?  That it's a valid url?  Or it actually points
> to a resource that really exists?  If the former, fine (and a very good
> idea, seeing I've seen quite a few cases where the LONGDESC attribute
> actually contains the descriptive text in the value, rather than a URL
> pointing to where to find the text), but if the latter, then testing this
> automatically becomes potentially expensive on a large site (well, it would,
> if anyone actually used LONGDESC).
>
================================
 Response from the Working Group
================================

Thank you, we have updated the test procedure to clarify these issues. See
http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/WCAG20/WD-WCAG20-TECHS/H45.html .

Could you let us know by Monday, December 8 whether you are satisfied with
our resolution? If that date is not possible, please reply to this message
indicating when you will be able to respond.

If we do not hear from you by Monday, December 8, we will assume that you
are satisfied with the responses to your comments.

Thanks again for the interest that you have taken in these guidelines.

Loretta Guarino Reid, WCAG WG Co-Chair
Gregg Vanderheiden, WCAG WG Co-Chair
Michael Cooper, WCAG WG Staff Contact