- From: Leif Halvard Silli <xn--mlform-iua@xn--mlform-iua.no>
- Date: Sat, 19 Dec 2009 04:19:17 +0100
- To: Ian Hickson <ian@hixie.ch>
- Cc: HTML Accessibility Task Force <public-html-a11y@w3.org>
Ian Hickson, Sat, 19 Dec 2009 02:14:49 +0000 (UTC): > On Sat, 19 Dec 2009, Leif Halvard Silli wrote: >> Ian Hickson, Sat, 19 Dec 2009 01:29:19 +0000 (UTC): >>> >>> What would <summary> do? >> >> 1) It would make the table summary programmatically detectable for AT. >> According to WCAG 2.0 it is important that the table summary is >> programmatically detectable. > > Isn't that handled adequately by ARIA? I am aware of 3 possible attributes: 1. Aria-label (an @alt style attribute) 2. Aria-labelledby (could point to the title part) 3. Aria-describedby (could point to the summary part) Do you consider any of these as adequate? Do you know other parts of ARIA that covers it? >> 2) A <caption> that contains non-caption content is unheard of in HTML 4 >> and in XHTML. <summary> would justify placing non-caption content inside >> <caption> (since <summary> carries a "not the caption" stamp). > > Even in print I've seen tables that include text explaining how to read > the table, so I think it's justified enough as is. A table - or a table caption? I'll assume a table caption. I don't know how long the explanations you have found were, but a typical caption is essentially one paragraph of text. HTML 4 doesn't allow block content in the <caption> at all. The distinction of <caption> in HTML 4 is much about length: the caption is short, the summary is more elaborate. Thus it is not justified in HTML 4 and XHTML that we place "user guides" inside <caption>. I think, for the author, it would be the same whether should use <p> or <summary>. Or, I actually think it would be a help. The <caption>, the way you have rewritten it in the draft, essentially becomes like <details> and <figure>: An element with a title part and a content part. [1] http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/caption
Received on Saturday, 19 December 2009 03:19:51 UTC