Re: Discussion on Change Proposal for ISSUE-66

Ian Hickson wrote:
> On Wed, 20 Jan 2010, Maciej Stachowiak wrote:
>> I haven't seen any follow-up discussion. I'm interested in hearing what
>> the rest of the Working Group thinks. Does anyone strongly agree with
>> Matt that the sentence he objects to should be removed? Does anyone
>> strongly feel that the sentence should be retained? Does anyone have
>> alternate wording to suggest that might be acceptable to everyone?
>
> I think that its's important that we at least acknowledge the possibility
> that user agents use image analysis techniques, and certainly that we
> explicitly allow the use of such techniques. Even a straightforward OCR of
> many images with no alternative text would dramatically improve the
> accessibility of many pages.

I don't feel strongly either way about keeping it or removing it.  I 
certainly don't have any problems with it myself, especially if existing 
OCR techniques are considered to be form of image analysis heuristics.

Perhaps you could replace it with a more technologically agnostic 
statement about user agents being permitted to use any other available 
techniques to assist the user in comprehending the image, and perhaps 
make an informative note about existing, widespread technologies like 
OCR, rather than hinting at more futuristic technologies that are out of 
the realm of possibility for most software companies today.

-- 
Lachlan Hunt - Opera Software
http://lachy.id.au/
http://www.opera.com/

Received on Thursday, 21 January 2010 15:52:47 UTC