RE: Font Family

Hi Wayne,
I feel like we are going around in circles.
Given that:

  *   Users can override font-family now;
  *   Font-icons are being dealt with separately.
What would you ask designers/developers to do regarding font-family?
It sounds like you want a generic statement for future possibilities. However, it would be confusing to add something that is already true. It would be like having a (non-accessibility) guideline that says “You must use bitmap graphics to display pictures.” Huh?
If someone comes up with a new technology that fundamentally changes how browsers work (so that the CSS cascade works differently), then we will probably have bigger fish to fry.
Cheers,
-Alastair


From: Wayne Dick [mailto:wayneedick@gmail.com]
Sent: 06 July 2017 18:42
To: public-low-vision-a11y-tf <public-low-vision-a11y-tf@w3.org>
Subject: Font Family

There is too much work between now and close of changes to consider font family. So, I will let it go for now.
However, after the 2.1 draft has gone forward I would like to take it up on LVTF again. This is because the ability to change font is a critical capability, and we have seen since 2008 that programmers can create unforeseen programming techniques that inadvertently remove important capabilities from the web.
Nobody invented sprites of icon fonts to be mean, but it did prevent deterministic font and color change. It took away high contrast settings from users.
There are for basic uses of font family:
1) Identification of Structural Semantics (italics, headings etc.)
2) Identification of Content Semantics (mathematics symbols like double strike N for natural numbers, and icon fonts)
3) Readable running font
4) Decoration
Users with low vision need to establish a mapping from each of these categories into content they can read.  Today this can be done in most cases (except Icon fonts and Mathematical Symbols). However, how long will this last. Bright programmers come up with novel uses of features without realizing the impact on accessibility. Do we wait until another threat to changing font is developed, or do we just state that authors cannot interfere with the users ability to change font family.
After the fray of getting SC's in I will show how this can be done with no impact on the developer.  It is difficult to explain now, and the group does not have time to read another intense quantitative document from me.
Sincerely, Wayne