Re: Long description and image on same page (was RE: [techs] Summary of techniques teleconference 22 September 2004)

> Nope. Even WinEyes does not recognize longdesc on same page. Both JAWS
> and WinEyes do nothing even if you give full path of longdesc  that
> links to same page.

Then they're violating the spec.

<http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40/struct/objects.html#adef-longdesc-IMG>

The longdesc attribute's value is a URI, which can be fully-qualified, 
relative, high in vitamin C, turbocharged, or whatever else complies with 
the specification. A user agent must then deal with the URI _qua_ URI. 
(Mozilla on Macintosh gets this semi-wrong: You have to copy and paste the 
address. Apparently Windows Moz makes it a link directly.)

> It's entirely possible that longdesc isn't the best technique to use,
> and in fact an explicit text link might not always be the best thing
> either-- I would be interested in finding/learning about techniques that
> would establish an explicit association between an image and its
> description that don't necessarily employ a linking technique, rather
> something that a user agent could identify and report (at the user's
> discretion, for example).

How is the user agent, which is merely a dumb machine, going to associate 
the two without "a linking technique"?

Anyway, while long descriptions of all sorts are interesting, they are 
rarely needed. Even finding a large enough corpus of data to compare 
techniques is difficult without manufacturing unrealistic test cases.


-- 

     Joe Clark | joeclark@joeclark.org
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     Expect criticism if you top-post

Received on Friday, 24 September 2004 16:49:41 UTC