Re: Discussion on Change Proposal for ISSUE-66

On Thu, Jan 21, 2010 at 9:52 AM, Lachlan Hunt <lachlan.hunt@lachy.id.au> wrote:
> 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.

This, specifically, I strongly support.

~TJ

Received on Thursday, 21 January 2010 16:17:26 UTC