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Re: SC 3.1.2 lang exception: proper names

for

From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: May 4, 2019 3:32PM

My personal take here...

On 04/05/2019 22:12, Wolfgang Berndorfer wrote:
[...]
> 1. Conforming to SC 3.1.2 language attribution for proper names in foreign languages is necessary:
> a) Never. The SC says, proper names are an exception.
> b) Conditionally: Principle 3 is about *understanding* and proper names have also to be *acoustically* understandable.

Normatively, going purely by the SC text, it's a)

> 2. Conforming to SC 3.1.2 attributions are *allowed*:
> a) Never. Many changes of speech synthesizer languages are just irritating.
> b) Conditionally: Depending on user experience and hereby especially accessibility experience, language attribution can and should be considered.

b) - you're then going outside of the scope of WCAG, into "aural
usability" of sorts. It's up to you/your judgement. 3.1.2 does not
DISallow going above and beyond the normative SC text.

> 3. Following contexts should be mentioned for attribution of foreign language:
> - Block elements: Foreign language expressions in navigation-areas like "homepage" or "facebook" only need small effort in the template for the whole webside to get acoustically precision. So attribute the language change!
> - Usability: Whom is the text for? Experienced screen reader users are used to understand the wrong pronunciation of "Homepage", "Facebook" and the like in their default non-english synthesizer.

Again, that's up to you. Words like "homepage" or "facebook" fall under
the "have become part of the vernacular" exception. So same answer as 2 b)

P
--
Patrick H. Lauke

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