69560 - reword error message asking for alternate text for image

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(Core :: DOM: Editor, defect)

Description

[robinf]

Using build ID 2001021505, steps to reproduce:

Open a document for editing.
Click the Image button in the toolbar to display Image Properties dialog box.
Choose an image file in the dialog box.
Click OK without entering alternate text.
The following error message appears (with bad line break as shown):
"You should always supply alternative text for an
image,
but you may use a space if you really don't want it."

If I click OK to dismiss the error message, and then click OK in the Image
Properties dialog again (w/o entering alternate text), the dialog is dismissed
w/o the error message appearing again. So this message is a reminder, but the
user is not required to enter alternate text. They can leave the alternate text
field blank (no "space" character necessary as the error message implies).

I'd like to suggest the following as replacement wording:

"It is recommended that you supply alternate text that will appear while the
image is loading, or when image loading is disabled, and in text-only browsers."

Comment 1

[rubydoo123]

actually, the alt text should be required, especially for accessibility. 
Assigning to cmanske to ensure that the image dialog cannot be dismissed without 
entering the alt text.

Comment 2

[Kathleen :Brade]

set target milestone

Charley--we should put a space in the editfield after the the dialog prompt comes 
up (in addition to rewording the prompt).  That way, we always emit the alt 
attribute with some text (rather than "").  Then, always bring up the dialog/
error message if there isn't any text in the alt editfield.

Comment 3

[Charles Manske]

But we decided that absolutely *forcing* them to enter a non-space value was
not a good idea. Remember that if they leave it blank, we still write the
<title></title> tags, but with no content.
So I don't get why would automatically using " " would help?

Comment 4

[Kathleen :Brade]

Beth--can you address the issue about why alt=" " is better than alt=""?

Comment 5

[rubydoo123]

I need to eat my words Kathy! The better choice of the two is alt="", of course 
the best of the best would be a text string.

My initial understanding on cdata from the spec is that returns and tabs must be 
replaced with a single space, and that it must contain character data. Later in 
the definition, however, it states that all leading and trailing whitespace must 
be stripped - hence the alt=""

Comment 6

[Charles Manske]

So can we get agreement on if we should change the string or behavior?
And to what?
Adding Robin.

Comment 7

[robinf]

If you make the alt text required, then we need an error message similar to the
one I suggested above, but reworded slightly as follows:

"You must supply alternate text that will appear while the
image is loading, or when image loading is disabled, and in text-only browsers."

Comment 8

[Charles Manske]

I don't plan to change the current behavior that does not force user to enter
it, but we want to strongly encourage it.
The way it works now (behavior I'd like to keep):
When Alt textfield is empty, we put up the warning dialog *once* while they are
in the Image Props. dialog. So if they don't want to Alt text, they can simply
press OK again and we won't bother them (we use alt="" as the attribute on the
<a> tag in that case. If that happens, the next time they look at properties
for that same image, they will be prompted to enter alt text again after
pressing OK. Thus they really don't *have* to type a space, as current message
implies, but if they do, the alt value becomes " " and they are never bothered
about not having alt text again.

Comment 9

[robinf]

OK, I consulted our tech pubs editor and she suggested a slightly revised
version of the error message, for clarity:

"You must supply alternate text that will appear in text-only browsers, and that
will appear in other browsers when an image is loading or when image loading is
disabled." If Charley doesn't change the current behavior, then the error
message would start "It is recommended that you supply..."

Comment 10

[Charles Manske]

Sounds good to me.

Comment 11

[Charles Manske]

Attachment: new message for alt text

Comment 12

[Charles Manske]

Robin can give me a "r=", right?

Comment 13

[robinf]

r=robinf for wording.

Comment 14

[kinmoz]

Hmmmm, I was totally unaware of this press the OK button a 2nd time feature, and 
thought that I would always get that dialog unless I entered something.

It would be nice if we could display this new message in a dialog that allowed 
you to continue the submit without an alt text provided to avoid this 2nd 
pressing of the OK button ... also it would be nice to provide a checkbox on the 
dialog that said "Don't display this dialog again." :-)

The only problem I have with the current wording, is that it doesn't tell 
the user that they can submit their changes without alt text if the OK button is 
pressed a 2nd time.

Comment 15

[rubydoo123]

the alt attribute does get inserted regardless, and we should be strongly 
encouraging users to include content for that attribute, especially for 
accessiblity issues. 

Comment 16

[Charles Manske]

New text checked in

Comment 17

[sujay]

verified in 3/22 build.