[whatwg] alt="" and the <meta name=generator> exception

Leif Halvard Silli xn--mlform-iua at xn--mlform-iua.no
Wed Jul 25 09:20:04 PDT 2012


Edward O'Connor on Tue, 24 Jul 2012 10:37:20 -0700
> We could address this problem by making changes along these lines:
> 
> 1. Drop the <meta name=generator> alt="" exception.
> 2. Mint a global boolean attribute that, when present, indicates that
>    the element and its descendants are outside of the page author's
>    control (at least insofar as author conformance criteria are
>    concerned).

How about simply introducing a @generator attribute:

     <img generator='foo' alt='' src=bar.jpg />

> 3. Add a new exception to the "Guidance for conformance checkers"
>    section which prevents conformance checkers from emitting errors for
>    missing alt="" in subtrees marked with the new attribute.

Instead of a validator exception, how about simply let the validator 
split the validation results in several parts based upon who the author 
is? Here is an example report which identifies two document 
authors/generators:

* Main author report:
  No alt errors detected.
* Report for generator 'foo': 
  10 valid images but which the main author has not verified yet.
   
Here I assume that that verification flag is the *lack* of the 
generator attribute. I.e. when the main author somehow blesses the @alt 
text, then the generator is removed.

> Some issues that come to mind:
> 
> 1. What other author conformance criteria should conformance checkers
>    relax in such subtrees?
> 
> 2. Authors might start including such an attribute on the <html> element
>    just to get some kind of "valid html5" badge without actually
>    improving their pages.

This is easier to avoid if the validator identifies responsibility - 
see above.

> 3. What's a good name for such an attribute?

@generator.  :-D
-- 
Leif H Silli



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