UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
insidegovuk.blog.gov.uk
UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
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Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#2> And while ‘e.g.’ gets read correctly by screen readers, there are better, clearer ways of introducing examples for all users.
Strongly disagree. "e.g." has its place; it is often clearer than any alternative. Likewise "i.e.". "eg" is unpleasantly confusing even as an ordinary reader and should never have been allowed, but to remove "e.g." too is to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#3> And while ‘e.g.’ gets read correctly by screen readers, there are better, clearer ways of introducing examples for all users. Strongly disagree. "e.g." has its place; it is often clearer than any alternative. Likewise "i.e.". "eg" is unpleasantly confusing even as an ordinary reader and should never have been allowed, but to remove "e.g." too is to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Could you explain why it is better than, say, "say"?
(neat, huh?)
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#4The comments section of the blog post is a perfect example of bike-shedding.
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#5> And while ‘e.g.’ gets read correctly by screen readers, there are better, clearer ways of introducing examples for all users. Strongly disagree. "e.g." has its place; it is often clearer than any alternative. Likewise "i.e.". "eg" is unpleasantly confusing even as an ordinary reader and should never have been allowed, but to remove "e.g." too is to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Could you explain why it is better than, say, "say"? (neat, huh?)
Because there are cases where that's a weird thing to say, say, this exact sentence.
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#6> And while ‘e.g.’ gets read correctly by screen readers, there are better, clearer ways of introducing examples for all users. Strongly disagree. "e.g." has its place; it is often clearer than any alternative. Likewise "i.e.". "eg" is unpleasantly confusing even as an ordinary reader and should never have been allowed, but to remove "e.g." too is to throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Could you explain why it is better than, say, "say"? (neat, huh?)
They carry different connotations; "say" suggests a single example that is not necessarily representative but rather being used to make it easier to express the following part, whereas "e.g." can mean a list, and puts the emphasis on the examples themselves. One isn't better or worse than the other; rather both have their use cases.
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#7I love what UK Gov is doing, they actually sound like the kind of business that I'd love to work with (I'm totally surprised because it's a Government) and I'm learning a lot just with these articles.
I'd also love to see other governments to take a similar approach, but that seems highly unlikely for most countries including Spain (where I am from).
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#8Is it actually officially correct to use "eg" instead of "e.g.", and "ie" instead of "i.e." in English? (UK, US, AU, or whichever else?) Both http://dictionary.cambridge.org and http://dictionary.com seem to show only "e.g." and "i.e." for me?
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#9i.e., "We've decided it would be easier to make everyone who updates a page on the GOV.UK website change their language than to make everyone that makes screen reading software produce a product that reads screens correctly"
Re: UK government changes website guidelines due to buggy screen readers
#10Is it actually officially correct to use "eg" instead of "e.g.", and "ie" instead of "i.e." in English? (UK, US, AU, or whichever else?) Both http://dictionary.cambridge.org and http://dictionary.com seem to show only "e.g." and "i.e." for me?
No, the correct form is "e.g." and "i.e.", and screen readers cope with those fine. People also get "etc." wrong a lot, writing it as "ect", which presumably screen readers would fail at, too.
Since people get it wrong, and there are more natural ways of writing these, these guidelines seem quite reasonable.