- From: Sailesh Panchang <spanchang02@yahoo.com>
- Date: Thu, 28 Nov 2013 19:22:57 +0000
- To: HTML Accessibility Task Force <public-html-a11y@w3.org>, WCAG <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>, james nurthen <james.nurthen@oracle.com>
- Cc: RichardWarren <richard.warren@userite.com>, Marco Zehe <mzehe@mozilla.com>, Detlev Fischer <detlev.fischer@testkreis.de>
Hello James, James: "A sufficient technique for aria-label etc. doesn't seem like a good idea. Remember that authors need not use any of the sufficient techniques in order to create conforming content but they may use one of their own techniques which is accessibility supported." Sailesh:When F65 states aria-l* attribute does not fail, it means it is alright to use it to pass the SC. In other words it is an attribute that is AT supported to pass SC 1.1.1 as per F65. So it is a backdoor entry to list of sufficient techniques; in other words it will get interpreted as one. I do not think other failures are documented that way. I am saying, document it as a sufficient technique with guidance as to when and how it should be used. (This is comparable to 'use title attribute when label cannot be used'.) Then a failure technique can say absence of short text alternative by way of alt, aria-l*, title fails. Oh, does your above statement suggest that aria-labelledby / aria-label for images is no longer being proposed as sufficient ARIA techniques? Yes I agree that guidance for use / interpretation of two or more short alt attributes for accessible name should be part of sufficient techniques for those attributes. James: "Of course it is not its primary goal. However, the spec allows this usage. I'm not sure how you draw the interpretation that a spec which has roles for various document elements such as heading, img, list, listitem, math etc. is only concerned with interactive widgets. The global states and properties such as aria-label and aria-labelledby are clearly stated in the spec that they are " applicable to all host language elements regardless of whether a role is applied " Sailesh: And the ARIA specs also say use host language elements and attributes and use ARIA features when native elements / attributes are not available. This means that ARIA is meant to be used with a variety of technologies, some that might not have img and listitem and heading elements. In those situations, ARIA can be very useful and the "specs allow their usage" as you point out. My last email did say how I get the impression that WAI-ARIA's focus is on interactive UI elements. That seems to be the thrust in the Intro doc. And if WAI-ARIA is no longer a bridging technology etc. then the specs should be revised. It is by reading the specs as documented, a reader begins to learn and understand what WAI-ARIA is and is not. Kind regards, Sailesh -------------------------------------------- On Wed, 11/27/13, james nurthen <james.nurthen@oracle.com> wrote: Subject: Re: WCAG considering amending F65 to NOT fail missing ALT text if title or aria-label is present To: "Sailesh Panchang" <spanchang02@yahoo.com> Cc: "HTML Accessibility Task Force" <public-html-a11y@w3.org>, "WCAG" <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>, public-comments-wcag20@w3.org, "RichardWarren" <richard.warren@userite.com>, "Marco Zehe" <mzehe@mozilla.com>, "Detlev Fischer" <detlev.fischer@testkreis.de> Date: Wednesday, November 27, 2013, 1:44 PM On 11/27/2013 10:28 AM, Sailesh Panchang wrote: The Techniques doc http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20-TECHS/ should first document this as a sufficient ARIA technique for SC 1.1.1 before the failure can be documented. Why? I don't propose documenting this as the best way of doing anything. IMO alt is the best way to provide a text alternative for content in HTML so documenting a sufficient technique for aria-label etc. doesn't seem like a good idea. Remember that authors need not use any of the sufficient techniques in order to create conforming content but they may use one of their own techniques which is accessibility supported. Failures are different in that any content which "meets" the failure fails the success criteria. My argument is that content which clearly meets the success criteria by providing a text alternative should not automatically fail just because it does not use one particular technique. I thought the whole directive behind WCAG2 was that it was technology agnostic and was trying to document outcomes rather than specific methods of getting to that outcome. As commented in the survey feedback, it is important to provide guidance to developers when two or more attributes for text alt are present in the code. I suppose both alt and aria-labelledby / aria-label / title should be identical. Aria-describedby should be different from the alt. Yes - it is important. A specific failure for alt text is not the place to do so. If we think this can be documented into a failure then perhaps a different failure would be appropriate. Yet, I have read and re-read the Intro to Aria http://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria/introduction and every time come away with the conclusion that ARIA is meant for rich content that cannot be marked ordinarily by HTML only. And these elements are interactive elements that have role, state, attributes besides name, description. The ARIA specs repeatedly identifies these as objects or custom widgets: "The incorporation of WAI-ARIA is a way for an author to provide proper semantics for custom widgets to make these widgets accessible, usable, and interoperable with assistive technologies. This specification identifies the types of widgets and structures that are commonly recognized by accessibility products,..." A critical ingredient is the "role", so when one repurposes a standard HTML element as something with a new role, ARIA kicks in. "Roles are a common property of platform accessibility APIs which assistive technologies use to provide the user with effective presentation and interaction. This role taxonomy includes interaction widgets and elements denoting document structure." "States and properties are used to declare important attributes of an element that affect and describe interaction." So "interactivity" seems to course through every vein of ARIA. And there's lot of rich interactive content that can be made accessible with ARIA when browsers and AT implement the specs uniformly. That's where efforts should be focussed. So from the reading of the ARIA specs I do not think fixing the alternative text for a plain non interactive image is its primary goal. Of course it is not its primary goal. However, the spec allows this usage. I'm not sure how you draw the interpretation that a spec which has roles for various document elements such as heading, img, list, listitem, math etc. is only concerned with interactive widgets. The global states and properties such as aria-label and aria-labelledby are clearly stated in the spec that they are " applicable to all host language elements regardless of whether a role is applied " A bigger concern is the accessible name / text alternative computation logic (identified as a feature at risk):the logic makes the ARIA attributes take precedence over native elements / attributes. The logic is fine for elements that have been repurposed with a new ARIA role; else the native markup should take precedence. That is not how it is defined. If you had an objection based on this the time to have made it would have been during the last call of the ARIA specification. This has now passed and the spec is at the point of testing the implementations in order to make sure the spec is implementable. Regards, Sailesh Panchang -------------------------------------------- On Wed, 11/27/13, James Nurthen <james.nurthen@oracle.com> wrote: Subject: Re: WCAG considering amending F65 to NOT fail missing ALT text if title or aria-label is present To: "RichardWarren" <richard.warren@userite.com> Cc: "Marco Zehe" <mzehe@mozilla.com>, "Detlev Fischer" <detlev.fischer@testkreis.de>, "HTML Accessibility Task Force" <public-html-a11y@w3.org>, "WCAG" <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>, public-comments-wcag20@w3.org Date: Wednesday, November 27, 2013, 11:21 AM F65 is a Failure Technique for 1.1.1. It is stating that if you fail F65 then you fail 1.1.1 1.1.1 States"All non-text content that is presented to the user has a text alternative that serves the equivalent purpose, except for the situations listed below..... " The definition of text alternative in WCAG is "Text that is programmatically associated with non-text content or referred to from text that is programmatically associated with non-text content. Programmatically associated text is text whose location can be programmatically determined from the non-text content." I'm don't see how a missing alt text, when the text alternative is supplied by another means such as aria-label, aria-labelledby or even title, fails 1.1.1 - assuming they are accessibility supported. Regards,James On Nov 27, 2013, at 3:54 AM, RichardWarren <richard.warren@userite.com> wrote: I fully agree with Marco, >> I now declare that I firmly stand with the opinion that F65 should NOT be softened. >> Alt attributes are simple, clear, easy to use and understand, compatible with accessibility software and tools. Richard From: Marco Zehe Sent: Wednesday, November 27, 2013 8:18 AM To: Detlev Fischer Cc: David MacDonald ; HTML Accessibility Task Force ; WCAG ; public-comments-wcag20@w3.org Subject: Re: WCAG considering amending F65 to NOT fail missing ALT text if title or aria-label is present On Nov 26, 2013, at 9:53 PM, Detlev Fischer <detlev.fischer@testkreis.de> wrote: The intended change of F65 is driven by the aim to publish more ARIA Techniques to establish ARIA as part of the toolbox, hopefully to be picked up by devs to make all sorts of fancy web stuff more accessible. I believe that this will be seen as rightful aim by most - after all, we can't stop the fancy stuff out there, we can only hope to provide the means to make it accessible. If the ARIA Techniques help doing that, this also requires some revisiting of Common Failures to even out the inconsistencies that Jared has pointed out. (To be more precise, this is necessary if we stick to the rule that finding a failure in the test of a Failure Technique will fail the SC in all cases.) Hi all, one thing to consider is that, if a web developer isn't going to put alt on an image, they're just as unlikely to put aria-label on it. There is a bullet-proof way to make images accessible, which is backwards compatible into the 90s. There simply is no reason to soften F65 in my opinion, by allowing ARIA on an image. Alt text is established, and those familiar with accessibility including ARIA are also familiar with alt text. I agree with janina's comment about ARIA not going away, but it should also be not the catch-all solution for just anything. It has a specific purpose, to bridge gaps, and that's what it is doing. And an img tag is nothing new, nor is it something fancy, and there is an established way to make it accessible. So despite my earlier concerns re CSS background images, I now declare that I firmly stand with the opinion that F65 should NOT be softened. CSS background images and so forth are discussions for other types of success criteria and deserve their own topic. Marco Richard Warren Technical Manager Website Auditing Limited (Userite) http://www.website-accessibility.com
Received on Friday, 29 November 2013 14:57:35 UTC