164312 - slashdot.org -- uses only 'alt' attribute for topic icons

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Tech Evangelism Graveyard :: English US, defect)

Description

[Jonas Jørgensen]

Comment 1

[Jonas Jørgensen]

(sorry about that.)

Slashdot uses the 'alt' attribute on the topic icons to give the name of the
topic. They should use the 'title' attribute as well, since 'alt' text is only
displayed when images are not loaded. 'title' OTOH is displayed as a tooltip.

Comment 2

[timeless]

actually, no.

What /. lists as alt tags are titles. i'm going to give a list of images with 
what I feel would be appropriate alt tags:

<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=126">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topictech2.gif"
     title="Technology"
     alt="motherboard"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=163">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topiclinuxbiz.gif"
     title="Linux Business"
     alt="Tux with business tie, briefcase and cell phone"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=106">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topiclinux.gif"
     title="Linux"
     alt="Tux"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=156">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicprogramming.gif"
     title="Programming"
     alt="jigsaw puzzle"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=134">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicscience.gif"
     title="Science"
     alt="Albert Einstein"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=109">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicms.gif"
     title="Microsoft"
     alt="Bill Gates wearing the Borg costume"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=103">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicus.gif"
     title="United States"
     alt="Flag of the United States of America"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=145">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicperl.gif"
     title="Perl"
     alt="O'Reilly Perl Camel"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=160">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicspace.gif"
     title="Space"
     alt="the Moon and Saturn and three of its moons"></a>
The preceding image is a good reason to give correct alt tags. We're not sure 
if that frontmost body is the Earth's Moon, another of Saturn's moons, or 
perhaps Jupiter (it was our first guess but we kind of decided it probably was 
wrong)
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=154">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicmozilla.gif"
     title="Mozilla"
     alt="mozilla.org's dinosaur masthead"></a>
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=111">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topicspam.gif"
     title="Spam"
     alt="Piggy bank pig containing the outline of a spam container"></a>

I'm going to include two more from http://slashdot.org/topics.shtml
<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=116">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topiccda.gif"
     title="Communications Decency Act"
     alt="We The People ... and the two subsequent lines of the 
constitution"></a>
I decided to spell out CDA because otherwise you wouldn't know that it's not 
the California Dental Association, Canadian Dental Association, Common Data 
Access (Limited), Canadian Dam Association, Canadian Diabetes Association, 
California Disability Alliance or something else.

<a href="http://slashdot.org/search.pl?topic=116">
<img src="http://images.slashdot.org/topics/topichumor.gif"
     title="It's funny. Laugh."
     alt="the big foot from Monty Python's Flying Circus"></a>

Comment 3

[Jonas Jørgensen]

No, in this case I believe alt and title should be identical. "Alternative"
doesn't mean a description of the image; it means a valid replacement for the
image. Your suggested alt texts would not make any sense when read to a blind
user; /.'s current alt texts do.

(BTW, it's only the five topic icons at the top of the page which lacks title
attributes. The ones next to the articles have them.)

Comment 4

[Hixie (not reading bugmail)]

timeless: your title and alt attributes are pretty much exactly the opposite of
what they should be. So in response to your e-mail ("How's my alt/title
writing?") the answer is "abysmal".

Comment 5

[Phillip Stewart :P]

Fixed?  Slashdot now uses the same text for both ALT and TITLE attributes:

<img src="//images.slashdot.org/topics/topichardware.gif" width="57" height="57"
border="0" align="right" hspace="20" vspace="10" alt="Hardware" title="Hardware">

Comment 6

[Jonas Jørgensen]

[e-mail], please read second paragraph of comment 3.

Comment 7

[Bob Clary [:bc] (inactive)]

Jonas, you are free to contact /. and ask them to do this.