- From: Joe Clark <joeclark@joeclark.org>
- Date: Wed, 4 Feb 2004 21:04:50 -0500
- To: WAI-GL <w3c-wai-gl@w3.org>
<http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-gl/2004JanMar/0087.html> >>Is validity an accessibility issue? >> >>The need to use technologies according to specification is a >>broader issue than most of the guidelines in WCAG. In issue 572 as >>well as on the mailinglist, people have wondered whether this >>guideline should be in WCAG because they feel it's not about >>accessibility. Others have argued that valid markup increases the >>chances of correct rendering of the content which directly benefits >>accessibility. I canvassed the makers of Two Leading Screen Readers. Take a wild guess as to which two. >[Product 1] does tend to behave better with valid code because the >browser behaves better with valid code. Take, for example, tables. >Invalid table code may cause tables to be rendered incorrectly, >thereby causing [Product 1] to read them incorrectly. Since we get >information about the page directly from the DOM, if the DOM is >invalid, the information we're presenting to the user has the >potential to be invalid as well. Ideally, if the DOM is correct, we >will be correct. And: >The developer who handles the html code states that valid html is >very important for screen readers as working around it is one of our >greatest hassles. > >As for the specific elements and attributes supported by [Product >2], I will have a comprehensive list available by mid-February. Our >documentation team is working on some training materials for making >accessible web sites and this will be a portion of their effort. -- Joe Clark | joeclark@joeclark.org | <http://joeclark.org/access/> Author, _Building Accessible Websites_ | <http://joeclark.org/book/> Expect criticism if you top-post
Received on Wednesday, 4 February 2004 21:13:44 UTC