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Thread: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
Number of posts in this thread: 9 (In chronological order)
From: Tessie Teoh
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 4:20PM
Subject: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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Hi,
We are currently programming a website and were wondering if we should
wrap common abbreviations in corresponding tags, for example wrap "Jan"
for January or "NSW" for New South Wales.
Would this help screen reader users to understand pages better or would
they be so familiar
with these abbreviations that it would be unnecessary and annoying?
Thank you.
Cheers,
Tessie
Tessie Teoh
User Experience Architect
Creative Services Unit
Fairfax Digital
Level 2, 1 Darling Island Road
Pyrmont NSW 2009
T: 02 8596 4909
F: 02 85964466
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From: Bill Mason
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 4:25PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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Tessie Teoh wrote:
> We are currently programming a website and were wondering if we should
> wrap common abbreviations in corresponding tags, for example wrap "Jan"
> for January or "NSW" for New South Wales.
I would just like to observe that "NSW" isn't common if you don't live
in that geographical region. :) On a first skim, I thought it was a
mistyped abbreviation for northwest or southwest.
--
Bill Mason
Accessible Internet
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http://accessibleinter.net/
From: Dean Hamack
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 4:45PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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I have been. Particularly in the two cases you cite where "jan" could be
confused for a person's name, and where a lot of people wouldn't know what
"nsw" stands for (I didn't).
Also a slight correction: multiple words spelled out with initials are
acronyms (like New South Wales), not abbreviations.
On 12/2/08 3:14 PM, "Tessie Teoh" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Hi,
>
> We are currently programming a website and were wondering if we should
> wrap common abbreviations in corresponding tags, for example wrap "Jan"
> for January or "NSW" for New South Wales.
From: Cliff Tyllick
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 4:50PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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Tessie, Bill is touching on context---and context is everything.
Your audience is part of that context. Your document is part of that context.
Are we talking about flight schedules for Australia? Then, yes, I suspect that someone who has to hear the screen reader expand each three-letter entry in the "Day" row would be just as annoyed as my wife would be I read the schedule over her shoulder and said, "Sun---that's Sunday, dear!" (At this point, I would either have to duck or find accommodations with the dog---or both.)
By the same token, "NSW" would make perfect sense to anyone who is familiar with Australia and is expecting to encounter an abbreviation for a state at that point in your document. Even those of us who aren't immediately familiar with Australia might recognize it if we encountered it just after the name of a city.
In another context, yes, you might want to expand those abbreviations. But I suspect it is sensible to assume that the same rules apply for the fully sighted and for those who rely on assistive technology---if one needs the expansion, the other does, too. If inserting the expansion would only annoy one, then it's also likely to annoy the other.
I realize that's not a hard and fast answer, but I hope it's one you can apply reasonably well.
Cliff Tyllick
Web development coordinator
Agency Communications Division
Texas Commission on Environmental Quality
512-239-4516
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>>> Bill Mason < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > 12/2/2008 5:21 PM >>>
Tessie Teoh wrote:
> We are currently programming a website and were wondering if we should
> wrap common abbreviations in corresponding tags, for example wrap "Jan"
> for January or "NSW" for New South Wales.
I would just like to observe that "NSW" isn't common if you don't live
in that geographical region. :) On a first skim, I thought it was a
mistyped abbreviation for northwest or southwest.
--
Bill Mason
Accessible Internet
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
http://accessibleinter.net/
From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 5:30PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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Dean Hamack wrote:
> Also a slight correction: multiple words spelled out with initials are
> acronyms (like New South Wales), not abbreviations.
all acronyms are abbreviations, but not all abbreviations are acronyms...
--
Patrick H. Lauke
From: Dean Hamack
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 5:40PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags? (correction)
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Scratch that, Patrick is correct. I missed the "United States" example in
the abbreviation definition.
So I guess either is technically correct according to the definitions.
From: Dean Hamack
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 5:45PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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On 12/2/08 4:26 PM, "Patrick H. Lauke" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> all acronyms are abbreviations, but not all abbreviations are acronyms...
--
Negative.
From Dictionary.com:
Acronym:
a word formed from the initial letters or groups of letters of words in a
set phrase or series of words, as Wac from Women's Army Corps, OPEC from
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or loran from long-range
navigation.
Abbreviation:
a shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase, used to represent the
whole, as Dr. for Doctor, U.S. for United States, lb. for pound.
From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: Tue, Dec 02 2008 5:50PM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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Dean Hamack wrote:
> Acronym:
> a word formed from the initial letters or groups of letters of words in a
> set phrase or series of words
> Abbreviation:
> a shortened or contracted form of a word or phrase, used to represent the
> whole
so you're saying that a word formed from the initial letters or groups
of letters of words in a set phrase or series of words isn't a shortened
or contracted form of a phrase, used to represent the whole?
P
--
Patrick H. Lauke
From: Waltenberger, Lon (LNI)
Date: Wed, Dec 03 2008 10:55AM
Subject: Re: Should we wrap common abbreviations in tags?
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You might like this 2006 in depth discussion of the issue at
http://www.alistapart.com/articles/hattrick#IRS.
We've found that it's best to keep it simple and follow Gregg's
Reference Manual without tags.
It can become overly complex especially if you delve into the
differences and similarities of abbreviations, initialisms, and
acronyms. Most folks know all 3 as acronyms.
Additionally, screen readers can mess with abbreviations and initialisms
by trying to pronounce them phonetically as a word or acronym. Even the
pronunciation of acronyms can be confusing. Some try to avoid this by
using periods or spaces after each letter. Each option has its own
issues.
Then there're the issues of deprecation and mixed support in browsers
and upcoming versions of HTML.
We chose a simple convention based on Gregg's.
Hope that helps or makes some sense to you.