Re: @title's relation to accessibility

At 09:46 +0100 UTC, on 2007-09-03, Steve Faulkner wrote:

> sander wrote:
>
>>[... HTML 4.01:]  "inspired by concerns for accessibility" is
>>extremely vague. So I still don't see what exactly @title has to do with
>>accessibility.
>
> a few instances:
>
> 1.Use of the title attribute on frames to describe the purpose of the
>frames is a WCAG 1.0 checkpoint.

OK, I can see how that might be useful. But the HTML spec should be clear
about this then. It needs to inform authors that @title on frames has a
special purpose, so that they can know how to use it properly. (Plus, it
seems confusing to me that authors need to use @title differently in one
specific situation. Something like @summary for frames might provide more
consistency.)

> 2. MSAA uses the title attribute value for the name property on images,
>form controls (if the control does not have a text label programmatically
>associated with it)
> 3. The WAI - ARIA spec uses the the title attribute for the nameref
>property; [...]
>
> 4. screen readers such as jaws or window eyes make use of the title
>attribute when images and form controls do not have alt text or
>programmatically associated text labels.

Understood. But all these seem to be about how @title can be used to guess at
missing information. Similar to browsers' "ESP engines" (guessing what
authors meant with their invalid HTML). They don't change the meaning of
@title. We should not want authors to author for specific UAs.


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

Received on Monday, 3 September 2007 13:09:28 UTC