- From: T.V Raman <raman@google.com>
- Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2007 16:00:17 -0700
- To: tkl02@health.state.ny.us
- Cc: ac@nomensa.com, olivier.gendrin@gmail.com, poehlman1@comcast.net, public-html@w3.org, w3c-wai-ig@w3.org, w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org, raman@cs.cornell.edu
Not quite sure what you were looking for with respect to my
comments on
http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/Chapter11.html
But here are a few.
0) It's a mistake to pigeon-hole Aural CSS as assistive/adaptive
technology -- it's a media-specific style technology for a
media that is waiting to happen on the Web at some
point. (where some point == when we're all tired of clicking
on flashing pictures)
1) Note the points that Joe recorded faithfuly in his article
with respect to what I said about using class values
intelligently as an author, and not worrying at authoring
time about how it might get used (today you'd call that
microformats).
2) The biggest risk with respect to accessibility is to define
tomorrow's authoring solutions based on yesterday's access
technology. The reason this is a downward death-spiral is
that today's access technologies were written yesterday to
work the content that was created the day-before-yesterday.
3) So: break the vicious circle, write clean content, use
meaningful markup, and intelligent software that leverages
your content in ways you never imagined will "emerge" -- that
in fact is the secret to the success of the Web. Arguments of
the form "no tool uses X", therefore "drop X" and "people did
Y yesterday, so bless it as the one and only solution for
tomorrow" typically lead to the death-spiral sketched out
above.
4) Taking the sum total of the above, Accessibility contrary to
common belief is actually extremely easy to do if done right.
Easy:
A) You dont need to go test your content with one or other
access tool. But then in a Web that stuck to its original
design goals, you wouldn't need to test your content in
different browsers either.
B) As authors, make sure you *always* own your content in the
sense that your content never becomes the slave of some
authoring tool that purports to "make your life
easy". They usually dont, and only make your life more
difficult down the line.
C) I myself came to XML/XHTML from the world of LaTeX, and *all*
my notes from graduate school that I wrote in LaTeX are
still usable and machine-processable.
Having moved from LaTeX to XHTML for a while, I now find
myself mostly creating content in:
0) LaTeXfor high-quality print output
1) Emacs/org-mode http://orgmode.org for pretty much
everything else
And generate XHTML when needed for the Web --
Using tex4ht for LaTeX and Emacs/org-mode export
facilities for the rest.
D) And for intelligent uses of class values see these
sections of the online Emacspeak documentation:
WebSearch:
http://emacspeak.sourceforge.net/info/html/emacspeak_002dwebsearch.html#emacspeak_002dwebsearch
URL Templates:
http://emacspeak.sourceforge.net/info/html/emacspeak_002durl_002dtemplate.html#emacspeak_002durl_002dtemplate
E) And in a final interesting twist on leveraging class
values,a few years ago if you told HTML authors to put
unique id values on containers, they would flatly
refuse. But any time you AJAX-enable your site with
JavaScript handlers, those handlers need to address
portions of the page, and authors end up putting unique
ids. As an example, see the "CNN Content" URL template in
the Emacspeak codebase.
Hope you found this a good read, it's Friday afternoon which is
probably why I got philosophical. Tighe K. Lory writes:
>
>
>
> In reading this article there are comments by T.V. Raman, who has posted on
> this list in the past. I would be interested in his opinion on this
> subject.
>
>
>
> "Tighe K. Lory"
> <tkl02@health.sta
> te.ny.us> To
> Sent by: "Tighe K. Lory"
> w3c-wai-ig-reques <tkl02@health.state.ny.us>
> t@w3.org cc
> "Alastair Campbell"
> <ac@nomensa.com>, "Olivier GENDRIN"
> 08/30/2007 09:53 <olivier.gendrin@gmail.com>, "David
> AM Poehlman" <poehlman1@comcast.net>,
> "HTML WG" <public-html@w3.org>,
> "WAI Interest Group list"
> <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>,
> w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org
> Subject
> Re: User Testing of Accessiblity
> Features
>
>
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>
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>
> Joe Clark has an excellent article that covers aural stylesheets.
>
> http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/Chapter11.html
>
>
>
> "Tighe K. Lory"
> <tkl02@health.sta
> te.ny.us> To
> Sent by: "David Poehlman"
> w3c-wai-ig-reques <poehlman1@comcast.net>
> t@w3.org cc
> "Alastair Campbell"
> <ac@nomensa.com>, "Olivier GENDRIN"
> 08/30/2007 09:40 <olivier.gendrin@gmail.com>, "HTML
> AM WG" <public-html@w3.org>, "Tighe K.
> Lory" <tkl02@health.state.ny.us>,
> "WAI Interest Group list"
> <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
> Subject
> Re: User Testing of Accessiblity
> Features
>
>
>
>
>
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>
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> Hi David, I agree, I avoid doing such things. There are still many
> designers out there that use such trivial images. My thinking is that a
> visual aesthetic can be represented aurally in a different way other than
> alt text.
>
>
>
>
> "David Poehlman"
> <poehlman1@comcas
> t.net> To
> "Olivier GENDRIN"
> 08/30/2007 09:33 <olivier.gendrin@gmail.com>, "Tighe
> AM K. Lory" <tkl02@health.state.ny.us>
> cc
> "Alastair Campbell"
> <ac@nomensa.com>, "HTML WG"
> <public-html@w3.org>, "WAI Interest
> Group list" <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
> Subject
> Re: User Testing of Accessiblity
> Features
>
>
>
>
>
>
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>
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> So why put useless stuff on the page in the first place? If it is there it
>
> should be useful, if it is useful, we need to know it is there.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Tighe K. Lory" <tkl02@health.state.ny.us>
> To: "Olivier GENDRIN" <olivier.gendrin@gmail.com>
> Cc: "Alastair Campbell" <ac@nomensa.com>; "HTML WG" <public-html@w3.org>;
> "WAI Interest Group list" <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
> Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 9:22 AM
> Subject: Re: User Testing of Accessiblity Features
>
>
>
>
>
> > And my colleague Léonie would argue that if the image conveys something
> (even "just" emotive), then she would like to know it's there and what it
> is supposed to represent.
> >
> > That demonstrates the hard-core usability vs holistic experience divide
> quite nicely.
>
> Maybe we should think of this in the reverse. For example, if a designer
> were to use aural stylesheets to give different voices to various parts of
> a page -- should there be an alternative for those not using a screen
> reader? I would say yes, in most cases a designer would use a different
> font face/size. But the designer wouldn't put a notice on the page to
> non-screenreader users that different voices are being used. I think the
> same could be done for background images that are just eye candy. A
> similar emotive feeling could be expressed in a different way then just
> putting alt text on the page. It is harsh to the way the page is read, and
> gets in the way when the informative value is questionable. It reminds me
> of a point one of my former colleagues made in regards to the differences
> between print and Web media. He would say that they are different, and you
> can't just take a print publication and dump it on a Web page and expect it
> to be effective. Our jobs as Web developers is to convey important
> information to users, not document every visual/aural design choice on a
> page, that is not what the user wants or needs. I believe that
> accessibility and usability must be considered together when designing,
> What is the point of a accessible page that is completely unusable?
>
>
>
> "Olivier GENDRIN"
> <olivier.gendrin@
> gmail.com> To
> "Alastair Campbell"
> 08/30/2007 06:45 <ac@nomensa.com>
> AM cc
> "Tighe K. Lory"
> <tkl02@health.state.ny.us>, "WAI
> Interest Group list"
> <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>, "HTML WG"
> <public-html@w3.org>
> Subject
> Re: User Testing of Accessiblity
> Features
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> On 8/30/07, Alastair Campbell <ac@nomensa.com> wrote:
> >
> > Tighe K. Lory wrote:
> > > An example would be a stockphoto of a person ...
> > > Putting in alt text would just clutter up what the screen reader says,
> and
> > > I think make the site less useable.
> >
> > And my colleague Léonie would argue that if the image conveys something
> (even "just" emotive), then she would like to know it's there and what it
> is supposed to represent.
> >
> > That demonstrates the hard-core usability vs holistic experience divide
> quite nicely.
>
> I strongly opposed to that, because if you began to explain
> illustrative images (which generaly convey emotive, or mood
> informations), you will also have to explain the graphical choises of
> the website, because a website that uses sharp lines has not the same
> emotive sense that a website that uses round corners...
>
> So it leads directly to have alt even on CSS background images,
> because of emotion...
>
> --
> Olivier G.
> http://www.lespacedunmatin.info/blog/
>
>
>
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> IMPORTANT NOTICE: This e-mail and any attachments may contain confidential or sensitive information which is, or may be, legally privileged or otherwise protected by law from further disclosure. It is intended only for the addressee. If you received this in error or from someone who was not authorized to send it to you, please do not distribute, copy or use it or any attachments. Please notify the sender immediately by reply e-mail and delete this from your system. Thank you for your cooperation.
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--
Best Regards,
--raman
Title: Research Scientist
Email: raman@google.com
WWW: http://emacspeak.sf.net/raman/
Google: tv+raman
GTalk: raman@google.com, tv.raman.tv@gmail.com
PGP: http://emacspeak.sf.net/raman/raman-almaden.asc
Received on Friday, 31 August 2007 23:01:09 UTC