To make my web site XHTML compliant, I have added a title attribute to all of my IMG tags.
However, when you mouseover an image, the text from my title attribute displays as a small popup. I don't want that text to be viewable.
Question: How do I prevent the browser from displaying the title attribute text as a popup while still keeping the title attribute present?
<img src="..." title="text that gets displayed as a popup but I don't want it to" />
You don't have to have a title to be compliant, you need an alt.
The behaviour you are seeing is the correct implementation by the UA of title so is hard/impossible to override.
This is browser specific. Some browsers choose to display the title attribute, some choose not to display anything, and some even choose to display the alt attribute instead. Though lately this has become more uniform across browsers, with most of them leaning to the title attribute..
Title is meant to be shown, if you want an image description that does not show except for screen readers, use the alt attribute which is only shown if the image cannot be displayed (=> Screen readers).
Use ALT and TITLE together. Put your nice, helpful text in the alt tag and then nothing in the title tag like so:
<img src="http://www.google.com/intl/en_ALL/images/logo.gif"o
alt="Goooooooogle!"
title="" />
If ALT is no longer "valid" (is it?!), I suggest that any solution around this slight validation annoyance will be far worse than ignoring it.
I don't think this is a great solution, living with the tooltip is better, but if you set an absolutely positioned div with a solid background set to very low opacity (1%) and a higher z-index then your image, you should not get a tooltip.
<img style="position:absolute;
top:0;left:0;width:200px;height:200px;"
src="yourImage.gif" alt="the text you don't want to show"
title="the text you don't want to show"/>
<div style="position:absolute;
top:0;left:0;height:200px;width:200px;
z-index:1000;filter:alpha(opacity=01);
-moz-opacity:0.01;background-color:gray;">
</div>
Again, I don't suggest this, but this is just to show that there is a way...
It has been a while since this post, but I figure for all those who wander here from Google, here's my 2 cents:
The alt tag is fully valid--required even. The last solution works in nearly every browser, and where it doesn't work, a tiny rectangular tooltip will be shown with no text. The title tag overrides the alt tag and forces a specific tooltip to be shown. I don't know why people voted this down, considering it's the best solution here.
For those of you who see this as a bad markup: for a general website, yes, this isn't good practice. This is a modern age of the web, however, and you have to also consider web applications and very obscure one-off situations where this might be the best possible solution given the markup options we have to work with. We all know web 2.0 is only MOSTLY there. ;)
PROPOSED ALTERNATIVE:
Personally, I would suggest creating a div the size of the image and setting its background-image to the src that you want to use. There is DEFINITELY no tooltip this way, regardless of browser, and it's 100% compliant with everything. This will not work if it's an inline image, but it's pretty rare to use an image inline with text and not want a tooltip (an icon beside links, for instance, a great tooltip might be "External Link", or for a mailto:, "Send an email to:", etc.)
Related
Let's say I have an image like the one below.
According to WCAG, this image is functional because it links the user to another page. It seems like I should put the destination of the link in the alt attribute like alt="comic homepage".
Wouldn't someone with a vision impairment also like to know what the image is showing? Would that user appreciate something like alt="comic that links to the cloudtweaks homepage"? The comic doesn't seem to be purely decorative.
<a href="http:////cloudtweaks.com">
<img src="comic.png" alt=??? />
</a>
This page does something similar (scroll near the bottom of the page).
You have asked this question but not provided enough context. Seeing the surrounding content, the entire page, or the entire site would help.
Is there surrounding text that explains either the image or where the link goes?
Will the image appear on the page after the link, perhaps a more full version of the image (as in, all the panels if this image is one of many)?
Does the site behave similarly to another site or section of this site with which you have confidence users are familiar?
A screen reader is going to announce that it is a link, that it is an image, and then it will announce the image alt text. If you do not feel it necessary to provide some text outside of the image to show users, then you probably do not need to try to force it into the alt text nor into a title attribute (also, do not use a title attribute).
Basically you want to give sighted and non-sighted and low-sighted users the same experience. If you feel it necessary to manage expectations on where the link goes by using the alt then you should just provide it around the link or before the collection of links. Then it helps all users. If you do not think you need to manage the user's expectations, then do not force it on the non-sighted users by jamming extra text down their screen readers.
This situation is documented on the WC3 Website: Image used alone as a linked logo
The WCAG says that you should not describe the image text in this situation but the link function.
When an image is the only content of a link, the text alternative for the image describes the unique function of the link.
If you think that the text within the image should be described to screen readers users, you have to change the structure of your HTML, excluding the image from the link, for instance.
Comics
Image of the day:
<img src="..." alt="If the clouds ever did go down would it be called fog?" />
or adding the description after (note that using aria-describedby the description might be hidden)
<img src="..." alt="Comics" />
<div id="desc" style="display:none">If the clouds ever did go down would it be called fog</div>
But this may be quite perturbing, I would say...
I have a background image in my header area of my site. It's done as a background image for responsive design purposes. I would like however for screen readers to be able to read some information about that area (company info).
I have placed a spacer.gif (ya know...what we used to use in the old days of tabular layouts :) ) in that container and added alt text to it so screen readers will still be able to provide good accessibility.
I haven't found anything that says this is "ok" so I'm wondering about good practice or not. That being said, I also haven't found anything that says it's not good practice "not ok".
Can anyone shed some light here?
TIA
EDIT: I ended up using my own suggestion as I didn't get any feedback to tell me it was a bad idea. I will mark isherwood's answer as the answer because it is certainly a viable alternative.
here's what I did:
<div id="headerImage">
<img src="~/Content/images/spacer.gif" alt="Widgets For Sale Here At This Widget Store" />
</div>
where #headerImage contains the CSS to place my banner image as a background image.
That's probably a valid option, but it adds markup and the need to deal with another image file.
I would use an offscreen text element at the start of the element having the background image:
.offscreen {position: absolute; left: -999em;}
<div class="header-with-css-background">
<span class="offscreen">Information about the image here</span>
Other header content
</div>
You'll probably find that having such a class available proves helpful in a number of situations, such as when a form should have a label but you don't want to show it to sighted users because you have placeholder text on the input.
If you want screen readers to glean info about your company, add that to the alt tag for the background image.
According to the W3.org page, if an image is the only content of a link or form control, " Use the alt attribute communicate the destination of the link or action taken."
Follow this link to more complete discussion of best practices for use of alt tag in web pages, at w3.org
So I've been trying to make my site as accessible as possible (for non-JavaScript users, web crawlers, screen readers, etc), and I hit a large snag.
The site I'm developing is very image heavy. (I draw stupid stuff in my spare time and the site is a sort of a "showcase".) Each page in the site has a single image (or multiple, if context is needed or the image is several panels) that is usually accompanied by a single caption underneath. So when I got to the point where I had to add accessibility options, I wasn't sure what to do. For example, let's say I had an image of a man eating an apple and the joke was there's a worm in it. So the first thing I did was add a ludicrously descriptive alt text since it was the only way to provide an "equivalent" for screen readers.
<img src="appleeat.png" alt="A man bites into an apple. As it turns out, there's a worm in it!">
This seemed okay at first, but then things went awry really quickly when I suddenly found myself needing to add alt text up to 300 characters (!!!) for the more elaborate jokes and images. Not only that, but apparently alt text isn't for descriptions anyway.
So I'm having these problems:
Alt text is for equivalents, not descriptions. However, the only way to provide an equivalent in this case is to provide a description.
longdesc seems to be more suited for this feat, but longdesc is not supported by any browser (at least, according to W3Schools) even though it does seem to be in the HTML5 specification.
<figcaption> seems to be the way to go, but it ends up displaying text underneath the image in question, which is definitely not very appealing for my site, especially if I want to add additional captions and context in <p> tags or something.
So what do I do? What would I put, and where? I'm totally stumped on this, and frankly I'm not certain that making a site based entirely on images accessible to people who can't see very well is a good idea.
The alt attribute is for alternative text, i.e. textual replacement for an image, so in the example, it is adequate if it reasonably tells the same story as the image. In reality, most images cannot have texts that are full “alternatives” or “replacements”; it’s usually a matter of capturing some of the most essential message, if possible.
An alt text can be of any length. The statement that alt texts should not be descriptions does not mean that it cannot be detailed if needed. The point is that there are too many descriptions that say something about an image without conveying its message (like “big red bullet” or “A man in a canoe”).
The longdesc attribute is supported by some software but highly debated and not part of W3C HTML5 CR but being developed as an independent “extension”.
The figcaption element is for captions presented along with an image. It does not address the issue of alternative text at all. It is meant to be presented to the user, whether he sees the image or not.
If you want to provide complex alternative text (where "complex" could mean: containing lists, tables, audio/video etc.), you could either use an img element with a longdesc attribute, or an object element instead of img.
longdesc
In HTML 4.01, longdesc is part of the specification. In HTML5, it was removed, and is now developed as an HTML5 extension (but it’s currently only a Working Draft from 2013 Update: it became a W3C Recommendation).
Problem: You would either have to include the content on the same page, but then you shouldn’t visually hide it (as not only screen reader users may want to access this content). Or you would have to add separate pages for the content (but then search engines won’t relate this content to the image, i.e., you miss on ranking potential).
object
The object element can be used for any kind of media. Its content is the fallback content, which allows you to use markup for the alternative text.
<object data="appleeat.png" type="image/png">
<!-- the alternative content goes here -->
<p>A man bites into an apple. As it turns out, there's a worm in it!</p>
</object>
Here’s some discussion of alt text that might apply to your situation:
http://webaim.org/techniques/alttext/#context.
Although I agree with #Jukka that long alt text isn’t a problem in itself. It’s true that “alt text isn't for descriptions”, but only because alt text is for equivalent content. If the equivalent content to a particular image is a description of it, then that’s fine.
It’s just that for lots of images used on the web, that’s not true. For example, the best alt text for the Stack Overflow logo at the top of this page wouldn’t be
The Stack Overflow logo: an abstract in-tray overflowing with paper, followed by the word “stack”, and in bold, the word “overflow”
It would just be “Stack Overflow”, because that provides an equivalent experience for a partially-sighted person (i.e. it tells them which website they’re on).
But if your images are cartoons, I guess writing alt text for them is a bit like doing audio descriptions for movies. You need to be more descriptive if you want to provide an equivalent experience. It’s certainly a challenge, especially if you don’t have experience, or partially-sighted users to discuss it with.
Joe Clark, in his book “Building Accessible Websites”, discussed describing images:
http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/Chapter06.html#h2-2290
And even providing alt text for comic strips, although his example is for dialogue-heavy strips, and I’m not sure what sort of experience it provides in today’s screen readers:
http://joeclark.org/book/sashay/serialization/Chapter06.html#h2-4240
Most people now use a figcaption as a caption under an image in an article, or for a short image description, like so...
<figure aria-labelledby="myimage1" >
<img id="image1" src="myimage.jpg" width="100" height="100" alt="image:My Image" title="Image of Something Cool" />
<figcaption id="myimage1">This is My Image Caption!</cite></figcaption>
</figure>
However....since you are associating a larger description with your image, and it is not needing a caption, try this...
<div role="img" aria-labelledby="myimage2">
<img id="image2" src="myimage.jpg" width="100" height="100" alt="image:My Image" title="Image of Something Cool" />
<p id="myimage2">Larger description of my image...</p>
</div>
This is also compatible with WAI-ARIA accessibility standards, which will read and associate your container "div" and your "p" description with the image. Notice the new attribute, role=img. Since the div, unlike figure, is not normally associated with an image, this helps the screen reader identify the div container as part of the image.
ADDITIONAL
Note that the alt attribute should be a text replacement for an image if the image never appears, a user agent cannot read images, or the image is slow to download. I like to show this info in a grey background image box in case a image breaks and a user needs to know what is missing. Its designed to tell a user what the image represents in a simple, short text string.
The title attribute on images is an important rollover box that gives additional image information, image map feedback, or where it would link to when the image is a clickable hyperlink. Some designers frown on the title attribute but I use it all the time in a lot of my HTML to add rich info to all my interactive and visual elements.
I think adding in descriptive text in a <figcaption> is a good idea. There is of course the problem with browser support, this should be able to be addressed with CSS:
figcaption { display: block; }
You could then hide this text by default figcaption { display: none; } and include a link somewhere that will refresh the page with the captions displayed through an alternative style - figcaption { display: block; }
This option then eliminates the need for javascript solutions and only gives captions to those that specifically request them.
You could maybe set this up with a little bit of php:
<head>
<style type="text/css">
<?php if(isset($_GET['CaptionDisplay']))
{
echo 'figcaption { display: block; }';
}else{
echo 'figcaption { display: none; }';
}
?>
</style>
</head>
HTML Link - Show captions
This is completely off the top of my head :) Let me know if I can better explain anything.
I think "equivalent experience" is kind of subjective, and I can attest from experience that many accessibility guidelines, while well-intentioned, aren't correct. For a screen reader user, just seeing the Stack Overflow alt tag logo wouldn't provide an equivalent experience to a sighted user. You should always describe any alt tags properly. I don't think having a longer alt text is necessarily bad, but if it gets too unwieldy, you could build a separate section in plain text. Thank you for taking the time to make your site accessible. Screen reader users do appreciate inclusive design and the thought-out descriptions.
I recently came across this tutorial that used a CSS background image to display a logo for a webpage instead of using an HTML tag. There was a placeholder text inside the div containing the logo and in order to make that text disappear, the author used text-indent:-9999px instead of display:hidden because he said that it's bad practice to use the latter.
So, why is it considered bad practice?
Because sometimes screen readers and search engines would ignore elements with display:none or visibility:hidden but not those positioned offscreen for the purposes of SEO and/or speech. However whether either method is 'bad practice' isn't really an industry-wide agreement, more of a preference thing depending on what the author really knows about these tools and what their objectives are for the site.
Also keep in mind that advice is at least 5 years old and that things change over time so what was 'best practice' then isn't automatically best practice now.
So, work out what YOU are trying to acheive and then consider your options and that is to my mind the 'best practice'.
Primarily because screen readers will not read hidden content, but many will read content that has been positioned off-screen but is still visible.
First of all there's nothing called display: hidden;, either its display: none; or it's visibility: hidden; or overflow: hidden; and coming to your question, I don't prefer using that, instead I use an img tag, with alt attribute which will describe my image, yes, screen readers DO READ ALT TEXT, if you don't have alt on your img tag, it will simply ignore it..
For example if am using img for my logo so I will use something like
<img src="#" alt="Company Name Logo" title="Company Name" />
Using a background image for a logo means you can place logo text in the same element.
One reason for this is so accessibility readers (for the visually impaired) will read the logo text when the logo can't be seen. However, you do not want the text over the logo, so you text-indent to hide it.
Content in display:none elements are not read.
I am not 100% sure on this one, but I also remember reading that some search engines ignore content in hidden elements. They may however index indented content, but this needs verification.
I am using ActiveScaffold in a Ruby on Rails app, and to save space in the table I have replaced the default "actions" text in the table (ie. "edit", "delete", "show") with icons using CSS. I have also added a couple of custom actions with action_link.add ("move" and "copy").
For clarity, I would like to have a tooltip pop up with the related action (ie. "edit", "copy") when I hover the mouse over the icon.
I thought I could do this by adding a simple "alt" definition to the tag, but that doesn't appear to work.
Can somebody point me in the right direction?
The alt attribute is to be used as an alternative to the image, in the case of the image missing, or in a text only browser.
IE got it wrong, when they made alt appear as a tooltip. It was never meant to be that.
The correct attribute for this is title, which of course doesn't do a tooltip in IE.
So, to do have a tooltip show up in both IE, and FireFox/Safari/Chrome/Opera, use both an alt attribute and a title attribute.
Just a minor point to add to this thread... there is no alt tag or title tag. The alt attribute is for images, but all other elements on a page can have a title attribute, which is the best choice for cross browser compatibility.
<span title="Click here to edit the foo">
Edit
</span>
You want a "title" tag. I'm not sure if this is necessary anymore, but I usually add both alt and title tags to make sure all browsers display the tool tip the same.
The alt property of an img tag works in some browsers, but not all (such as some mozilla-based ones).
The "right way" to do this is to use the title property.
Tooltips in HTML are the contents of the alt text for image tags, but if you're setting this using CSS you probably have a background:url(...); style instead of an image.
Use alt on the images and title on the links.
As Prestaul pointed out, the alt tag should work for images and title for links. However, this is also browser dependent...most browsers should implement functionality that displays this metadata as tooltips but they aren't required to do so.
Realizing, as Joel Coehoom pointed out, that my icon was actually a background image, I created a transparent.gif image with title and alt attributes over top of the background, and voila - tooltips!
good tool here
http://www.guangmingsoft.net/htmlsnapshot/html2image.htm
you can just use the tag abbr and the tittle atribute with your test
eg <abbr tittle="some text"> </abbr>
as that answer https://stackoverflow.com/a/61601175/9442717