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Re: Question: inlne headings

for

From: Bourne, Sarah (ITD)
Date: Aug 22, 2013 7:15AM


Bevi,

I feel your pain! Many of these boil down to an imperfect separation of presentation and content.

All platforms assume that headings need to not share a line with other chunks of content. Why? Because that's what we've done in print - for visual users - forever. Except some circumstances, such as bulleted (or numbered) lists of text blocks where the heading is immediately followed by text - again, a typographic convention to aid visual users. It seems that we should be able to override this kind of presentation style to accommodate exceptions.

There's been so much debate over so many years about the use of bold and italics. The problem is that we use them for a variety of very different reasons. Some, like calling out words that appear in a glossary (often presented in bold) or indicating a different language (often presented in italics) have mark-up that can be used. Others not so much: calling out the names of people by making them bold, putting the titles of books (as in footnotes and bibliographies) in italics. Yeah, they fit under the umbrella of "emphasis", but there are reasons for the emphasis that cannot be expressed.

Of course, trying to add new tags for every little thing would certainly be paving the road to hell. But it's always struck me as silly to change <b> and <i> to <strong> and <em> just to make them seem semantic, without providing a way to better indicate the reason for the change in typography.

sb
Sarah E. Bourne
Director of Assistive Technology &
Mass.Gov Chief Technology Strategist
Information Technology Division
Commonwealth of Massachusetts
1 Ashburton Pl. rm 1601 Boston MA 02108
617-626-4502
<EMAIL REMOVED>
http://www.mass.gov/itd


-----Original Message-----
From: <EMAIL REMOVED> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Chagnon | PubCom
Sent: Monday, August 19, 2013 4:22 PM
To: 'WebAIM Discussion List'
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Question: inlne headings

In documents (Word, PDF, InDesign layout files), the tags eventually used by accessibility technologies are created based on the visual formatting styles.

Paragraph styles apply the format to the entire paragraph. Character styles, on the other hand, apply formatting to just what's selected by the cursor, such as a word or 2 at the beginning of a paragraph as in my example.

I can't tell InDesign to convert a character style to an <H1> tag. The program can't do that (at least not at this time). Accessibility tags can only be generated from paragraph styles; therefore, the run-in heading must be its own separate paragraph in order to have an <h1> tag applied to it by InDesign. (This confirms Judith's comment.)

We have several technologies that are converging, and sometimes conflicting with each other.
1. There's the typesetting, word processing, and desktop publishing industry whose technologies and procedures go back to the 1880s.
2. There's the accessibility community with its procedures developed over the last 10+ years.
3. And there's HTML which developed 20 years ago but was only standardized during the last 15 years.

I wish all these players would standardize among themselves!
- Is a heading a separate paragraph or can it be just a few selected words in a larger paragraph?

- Is the correct tag for lists <L> or <ul>/<ol>?

- Do I bold some text by surrounding it in a <b> tag or a <strong> tag? Or do I just use the little B button in the top control panel of the software?
Or do I select the bold weight of the font, as in Helvetica Bold? What if I use an extra-heavy weight of the font like Helvetica Black, is that still tagged as <strong> or <b>?

These are the great questions of life that I ponder in the wee hours of the night.

- Bevi Chagnon
- PubCom.com - Trainers, Consultants, Designers, and Developers.
- Print, Web, Acrobat, XML, eBooks, and U.S. Federal Section 508 Accessibility.

-----Original Message-----
From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
[mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Jonathan Metz
Sent: Monday, August 19, 2013 3:07 PM
To: WebAIM Discussion List
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Question: inlne headings

Hi Judith,

I¹m a little confused by your comment. Are you saying that the only proper way for headings to exist is on their own line and Bevi should tell her designer that? What ³accessibility implications² are there for having Headings not appear on their own line? What difference would headings make in a document versus a web page?

Thanks in advance for the clarification.

Jon


On 8/19/13 2:55 PM, " <EMAIL REMOVED> "
< <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

>If there are no other headers grouping this information, I would
>explain the Accessibility implications to the designer and then ask
>that they reconsider their layout, particularly since this is for a
>document and not a web page.
>
>Depending on whether the appreciate the importance of delivering an
>accessible document, that may be all the convincing you need.
>Otherwise, this is a larger teaching moment.
>
>Best,
>
>
>Judith Blankman
>
>Interaction Designer
>Customer Experience
>
>Wells Fargo Digital Channels Group | 550 California Street, 2nd floor
>| San Francisco, CA 94104 MAC A0122-020 Tel 415-947-6583 | Cell
>415-601-1114 | Fax 415-975-7452
>
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
>>From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
>[ <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Chagnon | PubCom
>[ <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
>Sent: Saturday, August 17, 2013 9:48 AM
>To: 'WebAIM Discussion List'
>Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Question: inlne headings
>
>Thanks, Patarick. That looks like it would work in HTML and eventually
>in
>EPUB3 (which is based on HTML5 and CSS).
>
>In this case, these publications are designed in Adobe InDesign and
>converted to PDF where <DIV>, .classes, and CSS controls are not
>available.
>
>So it looks like the InDesign layout won't be able to format and
>convert an inline head for the PDF.
>
>< Bevi
>
>< PubCom.com < Trainers, Consultants, Designers, and Developers.
>< Print, Web, Acrobat, XML, eBooks, and U.S. Federal Section 508
>Accessibility.
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: <EMAIL REMOVED>
>[mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Patrick H.
>Lauke
>Sent: Saturday, August 17, 2013 3:00 AM
>To: <EMAIL REMOVED>
>Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Question: inlne headings
>
>Perhaps enclosing them in a container and making them inline?
>
><style>
>.runin h2 { font-size: 1em; }
>.runin h2, .runin p { display:inline; } .runin h2::after { content:" -
>"; } .runin { padding-bottom: 1em;} </style>
>
><div class="runin"><h2>Objective</h2>
><p> This report presents national estimates of blue widgets.</p> </div>
><div class="runin"> <h2>Methods</h2> <p>Estimates are based on data
>collected during 2012.</p> </div>
>
>P
>
>On 17/08/2013 05:44, Chagnon | PubCom wrote:
>> My government clients use a visual design technique called inline
>>headings or run-in heads. I'm trying to develop a way to make them
>>accessible.
>>
>> Sample of 2 paragraphs in the original format follows. The first word
>> of each paragraph is visually formatted to stand out, either with
>> bold, italics, or color.
>>
>> Objective-This report presents national estimates of blue widgets
>>
>> Methods-Estimates are based on data collected during 2012.
>>
>>
>>
>> I think they should be formatted as headings, H2, but because the
>> words "objective" and "methods" are part of a larger paragraph of
>> body text, they can't be formatted as headings. Headings are
>> formatted for the entire paragraph, not a partial paragraph.
>>
>> Is there any tag that's appropriate for these "mini headings" at the
>> beginning of a paragraph of body text?
>>
>>
>>
>> Another option is to split them into a heading paragraph and a body
>> text paragraph, but this is counter to US federal publishing
>> guidelines. Sample of this method (with the tags) follows:
>>
>> <H2> Objective
>>
>> <P> This report presents national estimates of blue widgets.
>>
>> <H2> Methods
>>
>> <P> Estimates are based on data collected during 2012.
>>
>>
>>
>> Your thoughts?
>>
>> - Bevi Chagnon
>>
>> PubCom.com - Trainers, Consultants, Designers, and Developers.
>>
>> Print, Web, Acrobat, XML, eBooks, and U.S. Federal Section 508
>> Accessibility.
>>
>> >> >> list messages to <EMAIL REMOVED>
>>
>
>
>--
>Patrick H. Lauke
>>re·dux (adj.): brought back; returned. used postpositively [latin :
>re-,
>re- + dux, leader; see duke.]
>
>www.splintered.co.uk | www.photographia.co.uk
>http://redux.deviantart.com
>| http://flickr.com/photos/redux/
>>twitter: @patrick_h_lauke | skype: patrick_h_lauke
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>
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