WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: Blank paragraphs

for

From: chagnon
Date: Nov 21, 2022 2:37PM

Gah!
Blank paragraphs!
As someone who works not only in accessibility but across all digital media
for all purposes, they royally f-up everything.
Different T T S have different audible clues to signal the end of a
paragraph. They might be slight, like a pause or dropping of the voice, but
as far as I know the clues are there.
BTW, technically they are paragraphs because they contain at least the
paragraph mark. But they don't contain any "real" content so are considered
empty or blank.
We haven't had a need for double returns at the end of paragraphs nor double
spaces between sentences since the retirement of typewriters in the 1980s.
35 years later and most folks haven't yet learned about before/after spacing
in paragraph styles.
Sigh.
We still have a ways to go!

- - -
Bevi Chagnon | Designer, Accessibility Technician | <EMAIL REMOVED>
- - -
PubCom: Technologists for Accessible Design + Publishing
consulting . training . development . design . sec. 508 services
Upcoming classes at www.PubCom.com/classes
- - -
Latest blog-newsletter - Simple Guide to Writing Alt-Text