Re: Responses to Tantek Çelik issues raised during third last call of UAAG 1.0

With event bubbling model used for scripting, every element potentially can 
be interactive.  The user agent can make pretty good assumptions from the 
markup that elements with an "on" event hander, marked up as a link or 
input controls is an interactive element.  Other elements maybe interactive 
based on scripting, which is difficult or impossible for the user agent to 
determine from markup.  Maybe the term non-interactive needs to defined in 
terms of "recognized through markup".

Jon


At 02:13 AM 7/9/2001 -0700, Tantek Celik wrote:
> > Resolved: The definitions of "interactive element" and
> > "non-interactive element" have been clarified as follows:
> >
> >  <BLOCKQUOTE>
> >    An interactive element is piece of content that, by specification,
> >    may have associated behaviors to be executed or carried out as a
> >    result of user or programmatic interaction. For instance, the
> >    interactive elements of HTML 4 [HTML4] include: links, image maps,
> >    form elements, elements with a value for the "longdesc" attribute,
> >    and elements with event handlers explicitly associated with them
> >    (e.g., through the various "on" attributes). The role of an element
> >    as an interactive element is subject to applicability. A
> >    non-interactive element is an element that, by specification, does
> >    not have associated behaviors. The expectation of this document is
> >    that interactive elements become enabled elements in some sessions,
> >    and non-interactive elements never become enabled elements.
> >  </BLOCKQUOTE>
>
>Through the parenthetical comment alone '(e.g., through the various "on"
>attributes)', it is possible to interpret pretty much every element as an
>interactive element, in that it is possible in popular user agents to
>dynamically attach the various "on" attributes to pretty much every element.
>
>Due to the strongly worded final sentence, specifically "non-interactive
>elements never become enabled elements", and since it is nearly impossible
>to satisfy the "never" condition of that sentence given the above described
>dynamic attribute attachment ability, the term "non-interactive element" is
>nearly meaningless with the current definition.
>
>I do not have a better suggestion to offer.  I am only pointing out the
>limitation (presumably unintended) of the current text in the hopes that a
>better alternative can be provided.

Jon Gunderson, Ph.D., ATP
Coordinator of Assistive Communication and Information Technology
Division of Rehabilitation - Education Services
MC-574
College of Applied Life Studies
University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign
1207 S. Oak Street, Champaign, IL  61820

Voice: (217) 244-5870
Fax: (217) 333-0248

E-mail: jongund@uiuc.edu

WWW: http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~jongund
WWW: http://www.w3.org/wai/ua

Received on Monday, 9 July 2001 10:32:29 UTC