Re: False aria-describedby expectations in ARIA Authoring Practices (longdesc)

I agree with Lief, this advice is incorrect and should be removed.

regards
steve



On 22 April 2011 03:26, Leif Halvard Silli
<xn--mlform-iua@xn--mlform-iua.no> wrote:
> Michael and Joseph,
>
> Where do we file bugs against your 'WAI-ARIA 1.0 Authoring Practices'
> editors draft?
>
> There is a much erroneous and misleading description of the
> possibilities of aria-describedby is in the draft. The draft states
> that it is possible to "follow" what you refer to as an
> aria-describedby "arc" from an img element to an anchor element - et
> cetera: [1]
>
> ]] ... different from the HTML longdesc attribute ... But if you wish
> to reference an external resource with aria-describedby, you can
> reference a link that in turn references the external resource. This
> requires the user to follow two steps, first following the
> aria-describedby arc, then following the link, but does address the use
> case. [[
>
> However, this is an incorrect description of the facts:
> aria-describedby doesn't allow you to "follow" the aria-describedby as
> if it was a link. Besides that it is technically wrong, the example you
> show leads to repetition for the user: first the textual content of
> that anchor element is read to the user when he/she reads the img
> element (without being told that it is a link nor be given opportunity
> to link to it). And when the screenreader user reaches that link,
> he/she gets to listen to the same link text again.
>
> Your claims in the draft is already being repeated in the wild. [2]
> Which seems entirely useless: In the HTMLwg, we've established (for the
> last time) one month before your last edition of the draft that
> aria-describedby does not have any such functionality. (I provide two
> of several possible links. [3][4]) The only thing that happens if one
> points aria-describedby to an anchor element is that the user is served
> the textual content of that link, without being whether taken to that
> link or being told that he/she listens to the text of the link.
>
> Please remove those false claims ASAP.
>
> [1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/PF/aria-practices/#Descriptions_external
> [2] http://rebuildingtheweb.com/en/longdesc-replacement/#c20110420054615
> [3] http://www.w3.org/Bugs/Public/show_bug.cgi?id=12243
> [4] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-a11y/2011Mar/0166
> --
> leif halvard silli
>
>



-- 
with regards

Steve Faulkner
Technical Director - TPG

www.paciellogroup.com | www.HTML5accessibility.com |
www.twitter.com/stevefaulkner
HTML5: Techniques for providing useful text alternatives -
dev.w3.org/html5/alt-techniques/
Web Accessibility Toolbar - www.paciellogroup.com/resources/wat-ie-about.html

Received on Friday, 22 April 2011 08:57:54 UTC