Re: Improving alt (was handling fallback content for still images)

At 19:51 +0100 UTC, on 2007-07-13, Smylers wrote:

[...]

> I'm less convinced about that.  Whatever value you pick for n, there's
> bound to be a webpage out there which has alt content of length n + 1.
> With the above "must" a browser would not be permitted to display the
> final character of the alt text even if it had enough room to do so.  I
> don't think prohibiting browsers from displaying content in this way
> helps users.

Agreed. In fact it even contradicts the previous "UAs must make the entire
contents of the alt attribute [...] available".

What about this then:

- Authors must use no more than n characters as the value of the alt
attribute. For longer alternatives authors must use longdesc.
- UAs must make at least the first n characters, of the alt attribute easily
discoverable and available to users when the image is, for whatever reason,
not presented. (For example, UAs may present the alt text in place of the
image; or through a tooltip or in a status bar on hovering the indicator of
the missing image; etc.)

(n, whatever it will end up to be, must be the exact same value in both
points of course.)

This way, the first point defines UA conformity, the second document
conformity. Together they define 'the point'.

Better?


-- 
Sander Tekelenburg
The Web Repair Initiative: <http://webrepair.org/>

Received on Saturday, 14 July 2007 21:32:08 UTC