RE: Illustrating Guidelines

Me always forgetfulness to "respond to all", so this it is my answer and the
last answer of they are!

Hi Sean (et al)

You are right. I referred to a complex image and to that the reading of the
language of the image is not a school subject.

But I believe that the question here is that we cannot demand that all that
is transmitted with text is also transmitted with images by no means that
everything is made in such a way that all the people with cognitive
deficiencies of any degree can understand it.

I believe that it is sometimes appropriate to illustrate a text, and the
maximum thing that one can request it is that the text is illustrated when
it is convenient, but it will not always be it. Also, there are concepts
that can only be communicated graphically and in an appropriate way through
the animation or the videotape. Will we demand that all the pages Web
contains animations or videotapes?.

And I believe that it is important to insist in the question of the
cognitive level exigible. The American commercial movies are made for a 13
year-old mental age, for that reason, many people prefer the European
cinema. Will we demand that the Web is, also, comprehensible for a 13
year-old mental age?

Kindest regards,

Emmanuelle

And Sean Response:

[BTW, you sent your reply directly to me, whereas the "et al" infers
that you may have intended to send to the list... you can forward my
reply on if you want to.]

> [...] I believe that the question here is that we cannot demand
> that all that is transmitted with text is also transmitted with
> images by no means that everything is made in such a way that
> all the people with cognitive deficiencies of any degree can
> understand it.

Well put. This is pretty much what I meant by the "scoping" of this
guideline - it is rare to require a piece of work to be comprehensible
to literally *anyone*, even if that were possible. The thing that
interests me with this though is the entire notion of adding the
images to the text rather than adding the text to the images - it's an
intersting way of going about it, and it points out some deficiencies
in our current UI markup structures (i.e. HTML).

> Also, there are concepts that can only be communicated
> graphically and in an appropriate way through the
> animation or the videotape. Will we demand that all the
> pages Web contains animations or videotapes?.

Not all, of course, but we should be careful to ensure that such a
thing is possible naturally. I guess that's more of a PF thing once
again, but as far as the guidelines go, we should be careful to
include the "demand when applicable".

--
Kindest Regards,
Sean B. Palmer

-----Mensaje original-----
De: w3c-wai-gl-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-gl-request@w3.org]En
nombre de Sean B. Palmer
Enviado el: jueves, 10 de mayo de 2001 19:07
Para: Emmanuelle Gutiérrez y Restrepo
CC: w3c-wai-gl@w3.org
Asunto: Re: Illustrating Guidelines


Hi Emmanuelle,

> The reading of an image is as complex as the reading
> of a text.

Not always - I'd contend that on occasion they are one step ahead. For
example:-

   Chair (a word to someone who understands English)

   [Picture of a chair] (to someone who has seen a chair before)

Both require the notion of a chair to be understood by the "reader",
but I suggest that anyone who has seen a chair automatically
understands the concept, whereas someone who comes across the word
without having the notion has to be taught it, possibly from context,
first. That's a extra step that is present in langauge, but isn't in
illustrations. But this is just an example - not a rule.

> the reading of the image is not a habitual subject in the
> schools, it is only given in specialized university courses.

Are you saying that someone needs a degree in order to recognize the
concept behind the picture of a simple object such as a banana? There
is a variance in the level of complexity in both lanaguage and
ilustrations, and I think it is unfair to catagorize either one too
strictly.

> the "esvástica" (the cross gamada) has a very different meaning in
> the India and in occident.

That is true, but citing one example doesn't make it a rule. Citing a
million examples doesn't make it a rule. A rule is defined by proving
that there are no exceptions.

> it is necessary that somebody explains to us what means in
> each context, for example, the symbol of a person in wheelschair.

I agree. This is why text and images are often complements of one
another. But it must be accepted that sometimes they are not. Anne's
picture of Geroge Washington and the associated text is a good
example - if you don't know who Gerorge Washington is, then you don't
know who George Washington is. If you only know his face and not his
name, then the picture helps. If you only know his name and not his
face, then the text helps.

--
Kindest Regards,
Sean B. Palmer
@prefix : <http://webns.net/roughterms/> .
:Sean :hasHomepage <http://purl.org/net/sbp/> .

Received on Thursday, 10 May 2001 16:02:19 UTC