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Re: Use of abbr for the scientiifc equivalent of a vernacular name

for

From: Andy Mabbett
Date: Apr 30, 2008 7:20AM

On Wed, April 30, 2008 13:08, Tim Beadle wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 30, 2008 at 1:02 PM, Andy Mabbett < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
> wrote:
>
>> Can anyone see any accessibility issues with this pattern:
>>
>> <abbr title="Passer domesticus">House Sparrow</abbr>
>>
>> I suspect the former, but would like confirmation; or otherwise,
>> preferably.

> It's surely a similar problem to the abbr datetime pattern in
> Microformats?

Yes; that's the context in which I was thinking of using it.

It's arguable that "House Sparrow" is an abbreviation of "Passer
domesticus", if you interpret "abbreviation" loosely enough, but...

> Anyone who has configured abbreviation expansion will
> hear the Latin name, rather than the English one, and may be confused.

...that was my concern also.

> Could you make it a user-configurable option? i.e. "Display species
> names in Latin" / "Display species names in English".

Not in the circumstances where I am thinking of using it.

--
Andy Mabbett
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