Tool Tip behavior

Dear Marjolein et al.,

Thanks for addressing both my question and my problem -- even though the two
turned out not to be terribly related!  Apologies to all about the missing
Subject line!

Getting back to http://www.dohistory.org, from an access point of view, the
main problem is the missing ALT content.  These are the folks who were
deliberately removing ALT tags because it distracted from their desired
JavaScript mouse-over behavior.

Is there JavaScript code that suppresses this default "tool-top/pop-up"
behavior of IE?  I was hoping that TITLE="" would do it, but that doesn't
sound like it would be the case.

In the meantime, I am continuing to educate (a.k.a. pester) the lead
administrator about the importance of ALT text.  They really are interested
in keeping the site accessible (as well they should be, they ARE spending
tax payer dollars after all) but, like many we deal with, are not willing to
sacrifice their artistic vision.

Is the DoHistory home page interesting (a.k.a. challenging) enough for
someone to accept it for "taking the Kynn challenge"?  Fixing it is beyond
my skills -- I just don't know enough JavaScript.  Can all the eye candy
stay, meet the P1 checkpoints, and satisfy the original site authors?

I know the last release of Java has some accessibility features built in.
Please take a look at the kewl-but-totally-inaccessible "Magic Lens" Java
applet at URL:
http://www.dohistory.org/diary/exercises/lens/
The "lens" is the rectangular box that initially appears at the top left of
the page image.  You click-drag it over rest of the page.  How could this
kind of thing be made accessible?

BTW, the NOSCRIPT question was left over from something I saw on the AdvHtml
list
http://bama.ua.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=adv-html, I thought it was applicable to
the DoHistory situation, but I guess not!

The question came up as to how to send script-free browsers to a parallel
site via something like:
	<HEAD> blah, blah, blah
	<SCRIPT type="text/javascript">
		<!-- script definitions content here ... //-->
	</SCRIPT>
	<NOSCRIPT>
		<META HTTP-EQUIV="refresh" CONTENT="0;URL=nojavascript.html">
	</NOSCRIPT>
	</HEAD>
Forgiving the WCAG prohibition on automatically redirection, this is not
legal HTML syntax either.  I have no idea how widely supported such code
would be, but it doesn't seem like such a terrible approach to me.

The work around was to have the main page pretty much JavaScript free
(yeah!) but have one script that invoked the JavaScript oriented site
instead.  This was even better!
	<SCRIPT LANGUAGE="JavaScript">
	<!--
		top.location.href=("http://www.somewhere.com/indexjs.html");
	//-->
	</SCRIPT>

Thanks very much.
Bruce


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Marjolein Katsma [mailto:access@javawoman.com]
> Sent: Friday, March 03, 2000 11:45 AM
> To: Bruce Bailey; Web Accessibility Initiative
> Subject: Re: [w3c-wai-ig] <none>
>
>
> Bruce,
>
> At 10:13 2000-03-03 -0500, Bruce Bailey wrote:
>> Dear Group,
>>
>> Maybe I missed class for this one...
>>
>> Please explain:  When does (JavaScript) SCRIPT go in HEAD and
>> when does it
>> belong in BODY?
>
> As a general rule of thumb, scripts within the BODY produce
> content ( document.write() ) or set up event handlers (BODY
> onLoad="onLoadHandler();"). The scripts in the HEADER define the
> functions and variables to be used (called) by those in the BODY,
> such a s function called onLoadHandler to be executed on load of
> the document. I'm simplifying, of course.
>
>> The formal HTML specifications do not allow NOSCRIPT in HEAD!  (SCRIPT in
>> HEAD is fine though.)  How does one make such use of SCRIPT
>> accessible then?
>
> No need for NOSCRIPT in the head (unless you're writing content
> within the head with document.write() ? - unusual).
>
>> I am trying to construct some explicit advice for fixing:
>> http://www.dohistory.com/
>
> Hmm... the dropdown thing "if you're interested in..." looks like
> a dropdown menu but doesn't seem to be? Looks like it needs
> fixing even _with_ scripts; I find it very confusing. A NOSCRIPT
> would display the whole text instead of the dropdown, I guess.
> (If it's not intended as a menu, why not have plain text, without
> the need for a script?)
>
> The links on the composite image in the middle would need ALT
> attributes at the least, probably echoing all of the text that is
> visible with a mousover. Without a script they would still
> function as links (if I understand the code correctly) so a
> NOSCRIPT is not needed for those.
>
> Hope this helps,
> Cheers,
>
>> Thank you,
>> Bruce Bailey
>> webmaster for the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE)
>> Division of Rehabilitation Services (DORS)
>> http://www.dors.state.md.us/
>> 410/554-9211
>
> Marjolein Katsma
> HomeSite Help - http://hshelp.com/
> Bookstore for Webmasters - http://hshelp.com/bookstore/bookstore.html

Received on Friday, 3 March 2000 16:00:56 UTC