Differences between xhtml basic and other versions of xhtml (in terms of accessibility)

Hi,

Here is an answer to your question:

* Objects, frames, inline-frames, scripts and server-side image maps are 
not allowed in XHTML Basic, so several checkpoints are, by definition, 
guaranteed to be OK. :-)

* All colours must be specified by CSS (no @bgcolor or @color attributes). 
This implies that XHTML Basic markup will always be OK in terms of 
color-blindness. That responsibility is translated to CSS.

* Nested tables are forbidden in XHTML Basic (though you can easily find a 
tricky way for validation). I guess the purpose of this is to forbid 
tables for layout, something which could better guarantee better 
automated evaluation for several checkpoints (mostly all the ones related 
to tables would be automatable).

* Nested focusable elements are forbidden in XHTML Basic. You can't have a 
"label" tag inside an "a" tag, for instance. I think this is good, in 
order to avoid ambiguity when focusing elements. XHTML Basic clearly 
forbids this (something which is an important advance from previous XHTML 
versions).

* No @style attribute (internal CSS) are allowed, thus providing 
the consistency of using only external CSS and allowing the style to be 
redefined by reader's CSS. Internal CSS may introduce ambiguity when the 
reader redefines the CSS.

* Some deprecated attributes like @lang or @target have been definitively 
removed.

* Some important elements like fieldset or legend have been incidentally 
left out, but Steven Pemberton confirmed to me that they will be 
reincluded in a future revised edition of XHTML Basic. :-)

Best regards.

Vicente Luque Centeno
Dep. Ingeniería Telemática
Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
http://www.it.uc3m.es/vlc

On Mon, 8 Aug 2005, Chris Ridpath wrote:

> Has anyone looked at the differences, in terms of accessibility, between 
> xhtml basic and other versions of xhtml?
>
> Cheers,
> Chris
>