[Bug 22297] New: [HTML]:

https://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=22297

            Bug ID: 22297
           Summary: [HTML]:
    Classification: Unclassified
           Product: HTML WG
           Version: unspecified
          Hardware: PC
                OS: Windows NT
            Status: NEW
          Severity: normal
          Priority: P2
         Component: HTML5 spec
          Assignee: dave.null@w3.org
          Reporter: david100@sympatico.ca
        QA Contact: public-html-bugzilla@w3.org
                CC: mike@w3.org, public-html-admin@w3.org,
                    public-html-wg-issue-tracking@w3.org

4.8.1.1.3 Charts, diagrams, graphs, maps, illustrations

---snip of document---

First, here's the good solution. This sample shows how the alternative text
should just be what you would have put in the prose if the image had never
existed.

<!-- This is the correct way to do things. -->
<p>
 You are standing in an open field west of a house.
 <img src="house.jpeg" alt="The house is white, with a boarded front door.">
 There is a small mailbox here.</p>

Second, here's the bad solution. In this incorrect way of doing things, the
alternative text is simply a description of the image, instead of a textual
replacement for the image. It's bad because when the image isn't shown, the
text doesn't flow as well as in the first example.

<!-- This is the wrong way to do things. -->
<p>
 You are standing in an open field west of a house.
 <img src="house.jpeg" alt="A white house, with a boarded front door.">
 There is a small mailbox here.
</p>

Text such as "Photo of white house with boarded door" would be equally bad
alternative text (though it could be suitable for the title attribute or in the
figcaption element of a figure with this image).

---end of snip of document---

I think this example will leave some people scratching their heads. I think
trying to work ALT text into the main body of the text, does not realistically
reflect what happens when a screen reader encounters an image. Under most
screen reader configurations the graphic will be announced, so there
necessarily be a break in the flow of the paragraph anyway. I don't think the
first example helps the flow of the paragraph at all. And then saying "This is
the wrong way to do things" and while presenting an example of perfectly
acceptable alt text, is going to confuse people.

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Received on Thursday, 6 June 2013 14:57:49 UTC