[html4all] Omitting alt Attribute for Critical Content Wiki page

[Steven Faulkner]

Hi Gez,
I do think there are situations where the user will not provide
(although they should) alt texts. the example cited in the HTML 5 spec
is that of bulk uploads to photosites. What is to be done in this
case?

On 23/10/2007, Gez Lemon <gez.lemon at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Harry,
>
> On 23/10/2007, Harry Loots <harry.loots at ieee.org> wrote:
> > The current listed "Solutions" i believe should be:
> >
> > 1. User enters attribute "_none" (alt="_none"). This entered value signifies a
> > conscious decision by the author that the associated image's alt attribute
> > should be empty.
> >
> > 2. Authoring tool (CMS) enters value "_omit" (or other) to signify that the
> > content editor has omitted alt attribute. This is the equivalent generated
> > value to hand-coded _none. (By providing this ability we make a clear
> > distinction between user entered and Authoring Tool generated.).
> >
> > 3. Authoring tool (CMS) enters value "_ignored". This generated value
> > signifies that content editor ignored the alt attribute.
>
> >From a markup perspective, it would be strange for a data type to be
> %Text with a few exceptions ("_none", "_omit", "_ignored", or any
> other predefined value). It's possible that the data type could be
> %Text with notes about predefined values for conformance, but that
> still results in name space pollution; if an author wanted to use
> "_none", or any other of the proposed values, they wouldn't be able
> to, as those values would have a predefined meaning. As unlikely as
> that scenario might be, it's not unthinkable that someone might want
> to specify alternate text of "_none", and I think an author should be
> able to do so. I don't agree that it's acceptable to reserve special
> meanings to certain phrases when mixed with %Text.
>
> Personally, I see this whole issue in terms of areas of
> responsibility. A markup language simply needs to make it possible to
> specify alternate text for non-text objects, and the definition of the
> alt attribute in HTML 4.01 does exactly that. It's the content
> author's responsibility to provide alternate text, and authoring tools
> should make it easy for content authors to provide alternate text.
> Relaxing the rules about whether or not alternate text is required (no
> matter how it's dressed up) doesn't help accessibility - it's
> ultimately just a get-out clause for poor content-management systems
> and/or lazy content authors. A markup language should require
> alternate text for non-text objects; authoring tools should make it
> easy to provide alternate text for non-text objects, and content
> authors should be educated to want to provide alternate text for
> non-text objects. "Too much time for too little benefit" just isn't
> acceptable. Entertaining the notion that alternate text is too
> difficult to provide for too little benefit isn't really helping
> anyone, other than poor authoring tools and/or lazy content authors.
>
>
> Best regards,
>
>
> Gez
>
>
>
>
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-- 
with regards

Steve Faulkner
Technical Director - TPG Europe
Director - Web Accessibility Tools Consortium

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