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Re: Alt text in Word 2016: Indicate null image & which box to type in

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From: Chagnon | PubCom
Date: Jan 16, 2017 5:37PM

<< Do you think Description is enough to catch almost everyone today? >>

I'd take a look at the standards and decide.
All stakeholders are supposed to abide by the standards, including all assistive technology manufacturers as well as content creators (us).

Alt-text is an attribute on the <IMG> (web) or <FIGURE> (pdf) tag.
When a PDF is exported from Word, the Description field in Word is converted to Alt-text.
When a Word document is converted to HTML (or imported into an HTML webpage), I have no idea if the description field is converted to Alt-text in the HTML. In my experience, alt-text doesn't carry over from Word to HTML.

The Title tag is not alt-text and doesn't convert to alt-text. With some file formats, it might put a Title attribute on an element, but it is not standard practice to put a Title attribute on a graphic <IMG> or <FIGURE> tag. I also can't find anything in WCAG or PDF/UA that specifies a Title attribute on a graphic. (If so, please let me know!) Therefore, don't count on any assistive technology to recognize a Title attribute on a graphic because they're not required by the standard to recognize it on a graphic.

So in my reading of all this, the Description field should be enough to catch everyone using AT. If an AT isn't recognizing and presenting the Alt-text, then it's failing WCAG and PDF/UA international accessibility standards. And shame on the manufacturer!

FYI, an excellent summary of WCAG is on WebAIM's site, http://webaim.org/standards/wcag/WCAG2Checklist.pdf. Succinct, well-written, and comprehendible by mere mortals. This version is copyrighted 2016, so I'm assuming it's the latest version of their checklist.

--Bevi Chagnon

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Bevi Chagnon | www.PubCom.com
Technologists, Consultants, Trainers, Designers, and Developers
for publishing & communication
| Acrobat PDF | Print | EPUBS | Sec. 508 Accessibility |
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-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of L Snider
Sent: Monday, January 16, 2017 2:29 PM
To: WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Alt text in Word 2016: Indicate null image & which box to type in

Hi Jonathan,

Does that apply to both NVDA and JAWS? I remember a while back that some people were recommending putting the same thing into the title and description, because then it caught all screen readers. Do you think Description is enough to catch almost everyone today?

Cheers
Lisa