Edit comment LC-1253 for Accessibility Guidelines Working Group

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Comment LC-1253: Comment Shortname:; Commenter: Henny Swan <henny.swan@rnib.org.uk> on behalf of Royal National Institute of the Blind; Message-id:; Section of the document concerned:

or; Refinement of the section concerned:; Status:
assigned to; Type:; Resolution status:
Response drafted Resolution implemented Reply sent to commenter; Response status:
No response from Commenter yet Commenter approved disposition Commenter objected to disposition
Commenter's response (URI):; Comment:
Comment: No mention is made of presentation of text i.e. left aligned vs. justified/right aligned text, long lines, multiple columns, overuse of different styles etc.

Proposed Change:

Add in.; Related issues: 840
(space separated ids); WG Notes: [TEAMB] LGR: http://www.cjlt.ca/content/vol28.1/mcmullin_etal.html indicates that line length is not significant for understanding, although surrounding white space is. See also "Is Multiple-Column Online Text Better? It Depends!" http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/72/columns.htm "What is the optimal line length when reading prose text from a monitor?" http://www.keller.com/articles/UIDesignNov2002.txt {SM] Would this be covered under "Principle 1: Content must be perceivable: Guideline 1.3 Ensure that information and structure can be separated from presentation: 1.3.5 Information required to understand and operate content does not rely on shape, size, visual location, or orientation of components. [How to meet 1.3.5] " Aug 14, Clarification from commenter: Hi Lorretta, Really what I am wondering is if there should be a mention of how text is presented as this is important to most if not all users as poorly presented text can be really problematic to read. There is no specific mention in WCAG 1.0 and I have found that on some sites that we audit there is a need for a checkpoint on how text is presented. The issues that need to be addressed are: - avoiding centrally aligned text - avoiding justified text - avoiding chunks of italic text - avoiding overuse of different styles on individual pages and in sites The guideline could read something along the lines of "Ensure text is easy to read" and the success criteria could then specifically address each issue i.e.: - paragraphs of text are not justified or centrally aligned - paragraphs of text are not italicised - text styles are used to back up structural change only (i.e. styles are used for headings etc to help the user differentiate different types of content) This is obviously a guideline that would also very much help users with cognitive and reading problems as well. Does that help clarify the issue? Henny Discussed in the 01 March 2007 telecon: resolution: Accept LC-1253 as amended. (Add guideline level advisory techniques) http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/2007/03/01-wai-wcag-minutes.html refer to http://www.w3.org/2002/09/wbs/35422/2007mar1teamb/results#xlc1253 {partial_accept} DONE add to GL 3.1, the following advisory techniques: - Avoiding centrally aligned text - Avoiding text that is fully justified (to both left and right margins) in a way that causes poor spacing between words or characters - Avoiding chunks of italic text - Avoiding overuse of different styles on individual pages and in sites Updated Internal WD 22 March 2007.; Resolution: Since these are all design decisions related to visual presentation, the working group believes that this issue is covered under "Principle 1: Content must be perceivable: Guideline 1.3 Create content that can be presented in different ways (for example spoken aloud, simpler layout, etc.) without losing information or structure." Satisfying these success criteria should let the user control the style of presentation of text, possibly via assistive technology. We have added the following advisory techniques to Guideline 3.1: - Avoiding centrally aligned text - Avoiding text that is fully justified (to both left and right margins) in a way that causes poor spacing between words or characters - Avoiding chunks of italic text - Avoiding overuse of different styles on individual pages and in sites; (Please make sure the resolution is adapted for public consumption)