- From: Anne Pemberton <apembert@erols.com>
- Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 21:02:05 -0500
- To: Matt May <mcmay@bestkungfu.com>
- Cc: William Loughborough <love26@gorge.net>, Kynn Bartlett <kynn-edapta@idyllmtn.com>, w3c-wai-gl@w3.org
Matt, You do have it on Word 97. Run Spell Check, and go into options, click on checkbox for readability information, and you will have more than you will want to know about how readably your text is. The fact that some members of the committee have their noses out of joint with Microsoft doesn't change the fact that many web authors, especially those who aren't high on the html hierarchy, use Word ... The guidelines need to be neutral on tools ... any computer-generated readabilty level based on syllables and words per sentence would work just as well .... The fact that it is "easy" to order that everything that isn't text be made text, isn't reason enough to kick out checkpoints that bring real accessibility to disabled human beings trying to use the web. Anne At 05:42 PM 3/12/01 -0800, Matt May wrote: >On Mon, 12 Mar 2001, Anne Pemberton wrote: >> >> Unless the content is quoted or copyrighted, it should >> be readable by the "average" user as defined by the newspaper/news >> media (to cover listening) ... which is sorta about 6th - 8th grade >> level ... > >I was a journalism major, and I would have a hard time going over my sites >to determine how appropriate their content would be, relative to media >style guidelines (of which there are many, and none of them normative). > >And we're not dealing with professional writers. Many content providers >may never have even had formal composition. It's unworkable. > >> Using a range would cover a variety of means to find out the readability >> grade level of the material --- easiest is probably in Word (on the Spell >> Checker ... works very well!) > >I don't have that on Word 97. I don't think the W3C would like to >require Microsoft Word or FrontPage as authoring tools, anyway. Even if >they did, arriving within some chosen acceptable range doesn't ensure it's >accessible in any manner like 1.1 makes non-text objects accessible. > >I won't go into the trouble with legacy content compliance, though I >reserve that right in advance. > >- >m > > Anne Pemberton apembert@erols.com http://www.erols.com/stevepem http://www.geocities.com/apembert45
Received on Monday, 12 March 2001 20:57:50 UTC