Changes between Version 1 and Version 2 of Ticket #17611, comment 51
- Timestamp:
- 06/18/2011 08:16:10 PM (13 years ago)
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Ticket #17611, comment 51
v1 v2 1 1 Accessibility is the reason I would encourage using a properly structured outline of heading tags. (hearty support of Elpie) Someone, somewhere (reference not at hand at the moment) recently bemoaned that only about half of screen reader users actually use the heading identification feature of their screen readers. The other part of that half-full glass is that almost half DO use the features. In a world of feature rich, and sometimes too-rich, software, a feature that gains usage by half the users is very impressive. 2 2 3 Knowing the intended heading level is a way for the blind user to understand the relative importance of a bit of content. For those who have never experienced a screen reader, one of the features is to navigate from heading to heading by pressing a "heading hot key." At each heading the level is announced, followed by the actual text. It is provides a very fast way of gaining the sense of a document without having to listen to every bit being read ... much like the visual scan many of us can perform every ti ne we open a new page. Having everything shout "Hey, look at me. I'm the most important." is a sure recipe for confusion. In this regard, blind users and SEO are very similar.3 Knowing the intended heading level is a way for the blind user to understand the relative importance of a bit of content. For those who have never experienced a screen reader, one of the features is to navigate from heading to heading by pressing a "heading hot key." At each heading the level is announced, followed by the actual text. It is provides a very fast way of gaining the sense of a document without having to listen to every bit being read ... much like the visual scan many of us can perform every time we open a new page. Having everything shout "Hey, look at me. I'm the most important." is a sure recipe for confusion. In this regard, blind users and SEO are very similar. 4 4 5 5 The HTML5 outline algorithm might someday give us relief in this area, but it is FAR too early to consider it even half done, let alone ready to eat. Few browsers accommodate it so far, and even fewer screen readers.