[Pmwiki-users] Heading Button and Semantic Structure / Accessibility

[H. Fox]

First:  The new graphical button bar is a fantastic feature!

I notice that the Heading button generates a level 3 heading.  That 
didn't seem right, so I did some searching on the subject of headings.

It appears that starting with heading level 3 qualifies as "header 
misuse" according to the w3C's /Web Content Accessibility Guidelines/.

W3C> Do not use headings to create font effects. Instead, use CSS
W3C> to change font styles. See CSS fonts for more information.

http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/WD-WCAG20-HTML-TECHS-20041119/#hx-misuse

The oversized, bold "A" on the heading button suggests that the button 
has something to do with fonts.  (Admittedly I can't immediately think 
of a better multi-lingual graphical representation of a heading.)

Would it be better for the button to generate a single-bang (H1) 
heading?  If so, the stylesheet could use CSS to present H1 headings a 
at a non-ugly size.  This would encourage using headings to denote a 
section's importance rather than to create font effects.

Here's the section preceding the one linked above:

http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/WD-WCAG20-HTML-TECHS-20041119/#headings

There's a link in that section to a discussion thread

http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/w3c-wai-gl/2004JulSep/0446.html

that leads to this:

Jim Allan>  "Braille has only 3 levels of heading. Generally, the
Jim Allan>  translation software will style the first 3 levels of
Jim Allan>  heading in a imported document (h1-h3)...

Here's more about headings and semantic structure:

WebAIM.org: Semantic Structure
http://www.webaim.org/techniques/structure/#correctly

At the risk of piling on, I'll point out that the XHTML 2.0 
specification (Working Draft) also says "The practice of skipping 
heading levels is considered to be bad practice."

http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml2/mod-structural.html#sec_8.5.

Maybe most WikiAdministrators don't consider it important for their 
sites to be accessible to the blind, but it seems like the heading 
button should encourage WikiUsers to use H1 first, then the other 
heading levels in order.

Hagan