- From: John M Slatin <john_slatin@austin.utexas.edu>
- Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2003 14:43:12 -0500
- To: "Matt May" <mcmay@w3.org>, "Chris Ridpath" <chris.ridpath@utoronto.ca>
- Cc: "WAI WCAG List" <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
I agree that null summary (summary="") should be allowed for layout tables. As Matt points out, this indicates a postive intention on the author's part to force screen reader behavior, just as the null alt attribute for images does. Use of the <th> element is *another* good indicator of the author's intent, in this case to create a data table rather than a layout table. By contrast, the absence of a summary attribute, like the absence of an alt attribute, may simply indicate ignorance or indifference on the author's part. John John Slatin, Ph.D. Director, Institute for Technology & Learning University of Texas at Austin FAC 248C 1 University Station G9600 Austin, TX 78712 ph 512-495-4288, f 512-495-4524 email jslatin@mail.utexas.edu web http://www.ital.utexas.edu -----Original Message----- From: Matt May [mailto:mcmay@w3.org] Sent: Thursday, August 07, 2003 4:49 pm To: Chris Ridpath Cc: WAI WCAG List Subject: Re: Table Techniques - Summary On Wednesday, August 6, 2003, at 12:42 PM, Chris Ridpath wrote: > In our techniques call today we reached a resolution for layout table > summaries: > Layout tables must not have a summary (not even a NULL summary). This > reverses our earlier decision that layout tables may have a summary. I disagree with this proposal. A null summary is more indicative of an author having decided that a table is a layout table. It is the only way people have agreed on to date that we can point out layout tables in code. > - it appears that layout tables will be deprecated in XHTML2 I'm doubtful here. Given that there is no means of semantically marking up a table as a layout table (which is why we're in this mess in the first place), deprecating its use as such is, shall we say, quixotic, since all they can specify is an element's presence, not its abstract use case. > - we should not require a NULL summary just to make the author "jump > through > hoops" That's the compromise we were, until now, willing to make. In testing pages for accessibility, I would not consider either summary="" or no summary to be a fail. Rather, I would consider summary="" to be a pass, and no summary to be a case for triggering user checking (in EARL 1.0, a "cannotTell"). Given that less user checking equals better for most authors, I would indicate the former as a success case in the techniques document (and thus indicate the same to the E&R tool vendors), but I would accept the latter, with author verification. - m
Received on Thursday, 14 August 2003 15:43:13 UTC