Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Accessibility/Alternative text for images

Changing the Napoleon image

Some editors in a discussion at the GAN talk page on incorporating MOS:ACCESS into the GACR have pointed out that the instructions in this essay are a bit contradictory. In particular, the example alt text given for the Napoleon image in the lead is redundant per the instructions in the final paragraph of the lead, which states that something like |alt=painting should be used, the instructions under the "Captions and nearby text" section, and the examples at the end of the essay. I propose changing the image to something where the caption diverges from an appropriate alt text description of the image. voorts (talk/contributions) 19:00, 24 September 2023 (UTC)

Did I go overboard?

In Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Doom (1993 video game)/archive1, I suggested the following as an alt text: Double-line graph. X-axis is years from 1993 to 2002". Y-axis shows usenet post counts ranging from 0 to 1200 per month. Red line ("doom+clone" or "doom+clones") peaks at about 400 in 1996, and tails off to zero again by 2002. Blue line (...) grows mostly monotonically to about 1120 by 2002, with an intermediate peak of about 850 in 2000. The two lines cross in late 1997. Both lines are close to zero before late 1993, when "Doom released" is noted with a visual marker.

So, my question is, in my zeal to provide a description of all the relevant information, did I go overboard? Should I have suggested something less verbose? RoySmith (talk) 22:11, 6 October 2023 (UTC)

Nah I think it's fine. Graham87 (talk) 06:42, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

Line breaks?

What's the right way to specify line breaks in alt text? I've been using a slash, as is common in poetry, but I'm not sure that's the right thing. In the current instance, I'm thinking of a tombstone inscription, where the line breaks are (probably) semantically significant. RoySmith (talk) 14:40, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

I think slashes will have to do ... line breaks in alt text don't work at all with either of the Windows screen readers I tried (and probably don't work well with many screen readers at all). Graham87 (talk) 15:07, 9 October 2023 (UTC)

Proposal re alt text as linter error and mobile edit microtask

Please see Wikipedia talk:Linter#Wikipedia Mobile App: Image Recommendations and New Lint Error. This is just a cross-post after the message at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Accessibility#Proposed tracking for images without alt text. Graham87 (talk) 15:53, 27 February 2024 (UTC)

Rewrite

The page should be rewritten; the Napoleon example at the start is contradicting the "avoid having the same details in both" advice in the "Basic" section. It would also help to collect best practices and guides from other websites. —Kusma (talk) 09:05, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

I agree, but a previous attempt to change this was reverted. Mike Christie (talk - contribs - library) 09:27, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

100% in agreement. The alt is not the same as the caption and yet throughout this article many of the examples are either the same or the alt merely says see caption. The Napoleon example at the beginning sets the tone for the contrary information throughout. I use this as a guide instead. It is much more clear. The alt is supposed to explain what is in the image to someone who cannot see it for whatever reason and why it is being used, i.e. function/context, for the article. SusunW (talk) 12:17, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

The redundancy was not there when the Napoleon image was originally introduced as an example, it was introduced in a "copyedit" that was never reverted. —Kusma (talk) 12:31, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

I have removed the "in his study in the Tuileries" from the ALT text, but the text still requires improvements beyond what I can do. —Kusma (talk) 12:35, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

In particular, should the ALT just be "painting"? —Kusma (talk) 13:09, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

I think that totally depends on the context of the article and our guideline should say that. To avoid redundancies, if it is simply to provide an image of Napoleon, painting would be fine. But, if it were being used to illustrate an 18th century/early 19th century French military uniform, one would explain what it looks like. Like you, I am probably not the person to rewrite the guide, but am happy to help. SusunW (talk) 13:18, 22 May 2024 (UTC)