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Thread: WCAG 2.1 SC 1.3.5 Identify Input Purpose - Address Attribute Values

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From: Steve Green
Date: Thu, Mar 07 2019 12:18PM
Subject: WCAG 2.1 SC 1.3.5 Identify Input Purpose - Address Attribute Values
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https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#input-purposes states that the autocomplete="address-level1" value represents the broadest administrative level in the address, and that in the UK, this is the post town.

The problem is that the post town is not the broadest administrative level in the address in the UK - the county is. Except for towns and cities that are not in a county, such as Bristol, which is both a city and a county (and also a unitary authority!).

So which value should we use? Should we always use address-level1 for the Town or City field? If so, that means we can't apply an autocomplete attribute to the County field if there is one.

Or should we use address-level1 for the County and address-level2 for the Town, which contradicts the statement in https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#input-purposes. Is that section of WCAG normative? It doesn't seem to say either way.

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Steve Green
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From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: Thu, Mar 07 2019 12:24PM
Subject: Re: WCAG 2.1 SC 1.3.5 Identify Input Purpose - Address Attribute Values
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On 07/03/2019 19:18, Steve Green wrote:
> https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#input-purposes states that the autocomplete="address-level1" value represents the broadest administrative level in the address, and that in the UK, this is the post town.

Note that it's not about the exact keyword, but about the intent

"The terms below are not keywords that must be used, but instead
represent purposes that must be captured in the taxonomy adopted by a
webpage"

[...]

> So which value should we use? Should we always use address-level1 for the Town or City field? If so, that means we can't apply an autocomplete attribute to the County field if there is one.
>
> Or should we use address-level1 for the County and address-level2 for the Town, which contradicts the statement in https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG21/#input-purposes. Is that section of WCAG normative? It doesn't seem to say either way.

Do what you think is best in terms of autocomplete keyword to capture
the *concept* of the broadest administrative level. i.e. follow the
technical spec, and what you think is best reflected there, to convey
the concept of the "broadest administrative level".

P
--
Patrick H. Lauke

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From: Steve Green
Date: Thu, Mar 07 2019 12:48PM
Subject: Re: WCAG 2.1 SC 1.3.5 Identify Input Purpose - Address Attribute Values
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What you say makes sense, but I am left wondering why the WCAG authors chose to include incorrect information about the UK. They only included examples of three countries (the others being the US and Switzerland), and they could easily have omitted the UK if they were in any doubt about our administrative system (which is very weird). Anyone who lives here would have known it's wrong.

Steve