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Bug 8623 - Graceful degradation when using the style element
Summary: Graceful degradation when using the style element
Status: RESOLVED NEEDSINFO
Alias: None
Product: HTML WG
Classification: Unclassified
Component: pre-LC1 HTML5 spec (editor: Ian Hickson) (show other bugs)
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All All
: P2 normal
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Ian 'Hixie' Hickson
QA Contact: HTML WG Bugzilla archive list
URL: http://www.w3.org/TR/html5/semantics....
Whiteboard:
Keywords: a11y
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2010-01-04 11:07 UTC by Gez Lemon
Modified: 2010-10-04 14:32 UTC (History)
5 users (show)

See Also:

Attachments

Description Gez Lemon 2010-01-04 11:07:29 UTC 
No mention of encouraging authors to make their applications degrade gracefully in the absence of style support or to allow for alternate presentation. Applicable WCAG 2.0 Success Criteria: SC under Guideline 1.3 (Adaptable: Create content that can be presented in different ways (for example simpler layout) without losing information or structure.)
Comment 1 Ian 'Hixie' Hickson 2010-01-11 11:37:44 UTC 
EDITOR'S RESPONSE: This is an Editor's Response to your comment. If you are satisfied with this response, please change the state of this bug to CLOSED. If you have additional information and would like the editor to reconsider, please reopen this bug. If you would like to escalate the issue to the full HTML Working Group, please add the TrackerRequest keyword to this bug, and suggest title and text for the tracker issue; or you may create a tracker issue yourself, if you are able to do so. For more details, see this document:
   http://dev.w3.org/html5/decision-policy/decision-policy.html

Status: Rejected
Change Description: no spec change
Rationale: The spec already goes to great lengths along these lines.

Here are some quotes regarding this:

"Authors must not use elements, attributes, or attribute values for purposes other than their appropriate intended semantic purpose."

"Documents that use style attributes on any of their elements must still be comprehensible and usable if those attributes were removed."

"In particular, using the style attribute to hide and show content, or to convey meaning that is otherwise not included in the document, is non-conforming. (To hide and show content, use the hidden attribute.)"

"Authors are also encouraged to make their applications degrade gracefully in the absence of scripting support."

I can add more, though, if you think that would be helpful. What exactly do you think the spec should say that it doesn't already say?
Comment 2 Michael Cooper 2010-02-11 17:26:34 UTC 
Per the proposal at http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-html-a11y/2010Jan/0245.html, the HTML A11Y TF does not plan to formally work on this issue at this time. This does not mean the TF has no interest in it, but does not have immediate plans to work on it. The TF may review the issue in the future.