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Re: Empty <P> Tags For Spacing

for

From: Lars Ballieu Christensen
Date: Feb 8, 2022 7:51AM

In my opinion, use of p-elements to achieve a certain visual presentation is a WCAG 2.1 violation (1.3.1); p-elements are intended to define paragraphs.. As blank lines are not semantically paragraphs, such use represents incorrect markup of content.

Venligst/Kind regards

Lars
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Lars Ballieu Christensen
RÃ¥dgiver/Adviser, Ph.D., M.Sc., Sensus ApS
Specialister i tilgængelighed/Accessibility Consultants
Tel: +45 48 22 10 03 – Mobil: +45 40 32 68 23 - Skype: Ballieu
Mail: <EMAIL REMOVED> – Web: https://www.sensus.dk

Vi arbejder for et tilgængeligt og rummeligt informationssamfund
Working for an accessible and inclusive information society



On 08/02/2022, 15.01, "WebAIM-Forum on behalf of Duff Johnson" < <EMAIL REMOVED> on behalf of <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

> On Feb 8, 2022, at 01:05, Steve Green < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>
> I'm not convinced it's a WCAG non-conformance, and I'm not sure it's even a nuisance. Does it have any impact on anyone?

…and even if it does have an impact it seems like a AT problem, not a file-format issue.

> Empty <P> tags are a big problem in PDFs, though. They cause JAWS (and possibly other screen readers) to say "blank", which we regard as a user experience issue, not a WCAG non-conformance.

IMO, this is a description of what screen-readers are choosing to do… and they should choose otherwise. That a PDF might include an empty <P> does not force AT to present it.

> More importantly, if they occur in lists, they break the list structure, which definitely is a WCAG non-conformance. We see this a lot in PDFs created in Word and PowerPoint.

Yes; people use paragraphs within lists. It is for this reason that PDF 2.0 includes the concept of a “Continued list” to provide support for this very common use-case.

Duff.