RE: URL for new Draft to Review

Hi Alan,
Thanks for the quick review.

1) Regarding
'authors should indicate with the "alt" attribute of the MAP element'
You are correct.  That should read the "alt" attribute of the IMG
element.   It is on our correction sheet and we were sure we had
changed that one, but it looks like we somehow missed it in the cut
and paste operations.  (Or we made the change on a wrong copy).
Thanks for catching it (again).   We'll fix it this time - and
quadruple check it.   (is there such a thing a mnemetic text?)
[mnemetic metal can be reshaped but it will return to its original
shape if heated]

2) Regarding REQUIRED
This is a topic that comes up a lot.  I will put this in a separate
email for thread purposes.

3) Ignoring the Required part for now - your suggesting regarding
wording on the image maps is interesting.  It doesn't capture it all
but it is an interesting tack.    We will have to look at this.

4) Ditto for the suggestion on spacers.  This one however is kind of a
hot one.  LOTS of opinions on null alt text.  However, in this
context, there may be places where at least a space I required to keep
text from running together if the spacer is removed.    Hmmmmmmmm

Gregg


-- ------------------------------
Gregg C Vanderheiden Ph.D.
Professor - Human Factors
Dept of Ind. Engr. - U of Wis.
Director - Trace R & D Center
GV@tracecenter.org , http://tracecenter.org/
FAX 608/262-8848
For a list of our listserves send "lists" to listproc@tracecenter.org


-----Original Message-----
From:	Alan J. Flavell [mailto:flavell@a5.ph.gla.ac.uk]
Sent:	Saturday, April 11, 1998 9:28 AM
To:	Gregg Vanderheiden
Cc:	GL - WAI Guidelines WG
Subject:	Re: URL for new Draft to Review

On Fri, 10 Apr 1998, Gregg Vanderheiden wrote:

> http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/WD-WAI-PAGEAUTH-0410.html
>
> Try it.  You'll like it.

I'm afraid we still have this problem in the imagemaps section
(section 3 in this document):

  'authors should indicate with the "alt" attribute of the MAP
element'

The MAP element doesn't have an ALT attribute.  The only elements
relevant to this context that can have an ALT attribute are the IMG
and the AREAs.

Also, there seems to be an internal contradiction.  The use of client
side maps _instead_of_ server side maps is "Required", (which
literally means that the presence of a server-side map, even in
conjunction with an equivalent client-side map, would be forbidden,
could that really have been the intention?), but the note then
discusses what to do when only server-side maps are used - which the
"requirement"  has literally already ruled out?

I don't really understand what the drafters meant by "when a
server-side map must be used", but I'm assuming they have some
concrete situation in mind.  Are they for example thinking of a
contest or puzzle, with the answers hidden in the server, and the use
of a client-side map could give the answers away?

Might I suggest that the requirement itself would be better stated as
"Provide client-side maps and/or provide alternative means of
accessible navigation".  That avoids any internal contradiction with
the rest of what is said, and seems to me to express the functional
requirements without unnecessarily enforcing one specific solution
for all possible imagemap contexts.


"Invisible images used as spacers"

I think the recommendation ought to read something like this

 ... 'Provide "null" (ALT="") or "white space" (ALT=" ")  alt-text,
whichever the context needs.'

best regards

Received on Saturday, 11 April 1998 11:56:24 UTC