Re: [libreoffice-accessibility] Accessibility of images with alternative text in LibreOffice Writer

Hey joanie,

On 2024-06-19 10:56, Joanmarie Diggs wrote:
> Hey Michael.
>
> The accessible description field is meant to be end-user consumable. So
> if the strings in question are end-user consumable (as opposed to a
> solution for, say, automated testing), I think that's ok.

Yes, the strings are end-user consumable.

> That said, if the tips are especially verbose, perhaps exposing them via
> help text instead would make sense??

From an accessibility perspective, that might make sense for some at least.

For clarification:
LibreOffice uses GTK's .ui file format, which allows to set the 
accessible description as a property.
Besides being used for the actual accessible description that gets 
reported on the a11y layer, LibreOffice currently uses the string set 
via that property also for extended tips (shown as a tooltip if extended 
tips are enabled in the settings). That is LibreOffice-specific 
handling, and overrides the tooltip property set in the .ui file then.

Because of that, there are currently "accessible descriptions" that were 
never really added with that primary intention, but rather in order to 
have these strings as extended tooltip texts, with the "side-effect" of 
them ending up as actual descriptions on the a11y layer.

In many cases, such strings are suitable for both uses; in other cases, 
they might not be ideal.
Therefore, decoupling accessible description and extended tooltip texts 
may be needed.

However, I tend to think that leaving it as is by default (use current 
text as extended tip + accessible description) should hopefully be fine, 
and then handle any cases that are too chatty on a case-by-case basis. 
(Decide whether the text is useful as accessible help text instead or not.)

Michael

--
To unsubscribe e-mail to: accessibility+unsubscribe@global.libreoffice.org
Problems? https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/
Posting guidelines + more: https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette
List archive: https://listarchives.libreoffice.org/global/accessibility/
Privacy Policy: https://www.documentfoundation.org/privacy