- From: gregory j. rosmaita <oedipus@hicom.net>
- Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2001 11:34:56 -0400
- To: <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>, "Charles McCathieNevile" <charles@w3.org>
CMN: Is it appropriate to eschew sesquipedalianism exclusively in popularisation of the more refined external to the academe and other exceptionally accepting milieux, or does it make sense to write clearly and simply even to explain complex ideas to people in universities? CMN: Actually i would argue that it is not any more appropriate to obfuscate meaning through terminology when the audience is a Masters degree seminar in philosophy than when the audience is a school class. GJR: while the opposite of "clearly and simply" is "obfuscatingly and prolixly", one should not assume that the lack of "clear and simple" language on a page is an attempt to drown a lack of true content underneath a deluge of obfuscation or an ill-conceived attempt to adopt an "intellectual air" -- hell, if i can accept the fact that a lack of ALT text is usually a display of ignorance, rather than a callous disregard for those who cannot see or are not operating in the GUI environment, why can't others accept the fact that terms such as "clearly" "simply" and "appropriate" are _subjective_ terms that _cannot_ and _should not_ be measured against any artificially "objective" scale of comprehensibility? running content through such an analysis is, at least to my mind, akin to validating a page and claiming, simply by virtue of the validation and the DTD (lets say, HTML 4.01 Transitional, which, after all is a W3C technology "appropriate" for the delivery of content in an accessible manner), that the document is accessible... yes, when something can be stated succinctly, it is more likely to prove effective, but when discussing astrophysics (or, for that matter, metaphysics), one can state things "simply", but that doesn't necessarily mean that the meaning of the content will be any "clearer"... that being said, i'm certainly glad that stephen hawking penned a "brief history of time" so that the rest of us could understand the "comprehensive history of time" which he holds in his head... speaking of professor hawking, his web site, http://www.hawking.org.uk/, is quite interesting and worth a visit by every member of the WG) i'm also not sure whether most of the techniques that you posted to GL passes muster, as they strike me as very language-dependent -- unless, of course, we are going to modularize a "clearly and simply" techniques document which lists all of the basic syntaxic and best-practice rules for every language known to mankind... gregory. PS: no, i had never heard the adverbial form of "prolix" before i typed it ----------------------------------------------------------------- LANGUAGE, n. The music with which we charm the serpents guarding another's treasure. -- Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary ----------------------------------------------------------------- Gregory J. Rosmaita, oedipus@hicom.net Camera Obscura: http://www.hicom.net/~oedipus/index.html VICUG NYC: http://www.hicom.net/~oedipus/vicug/index.html Read 'Em & Speak : http://www.hicom.net/~oedipus/books/index.html -----------------------------------------------------------------
Received on Friday, 10 August 2001 11:34:06 UTC