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a dialogue for adding alt text, below it is a list of best practices for writing alt text: Should be understandable to someone who cannot see the image Avoid repeating content already mentioned beforehand Do not include links Links are not clickable, and <br />are difficult for screen readers to read

2025-06-23 08:05:20

Freeeeeeeeeeeeee :ablobfoxbongohyper: :fluffytail: via #alttext

freeplay@wetdry.world

what are things i should add here

#AltText

2025-06-23 09:34:57

Jupiter Rowland

jupiter_rowland@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

@Freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee :ablobfoxbongohyper:‮‮‮‮‮‮

Here are some more:

Always keep in mind that the primary target audience of your alt-text are blind or visually-impaired people. Do not write your alt-text for sighted people first and foremost.
Do not start with "picture of", "image of" or "photo of". "Picture of" and "image of" are redundant because screen readers announce images anyway, and "photo of" is redundant because digital photographs are the default for online images. Do mention all other media, though.
Do not add line breaks. Line breaks are not a standard part of alt-text, and they are useless for blind or visually-impaired people because screen readers won't read them out aloud. Not all frontends support them, and they may cause nasty side-effects.
Do not add quotation marks from your keyboard. Quotation marks are not a standard part of alt-text, and they are useless for blind or visually-impaired people because screen readers won't read them out aloud. Not all frontends support them, and they may cause nasty side-effects or even severe breakage.
Do not add emoji or fancy Unicode characters. They will disturb the reading flow for screen reader users because screen readers will call all of them by name.
Do not add hashtags. They won't be parsed as hashtags, and links don't work in alt-text anyway.
Describe dimensions and distances relatively to what other dimensions and/or distances are in the image.
Do describe colours. Not everyone who needs a screen reader was born completely blind. Some people used to be sighted, and they have lost their eyesight later in their lives, but they still remember colours. But always describe colours using brightness, saturation and one or two familiar basic colours: red, blue, yellow, green, orange, purple, violet, pink, brown, gold, silver, black, grey, white. Do not simply use the name of a specific hue or shade. Not everyone who isn't sighted knows what it looks like. If you absolutely have to mention the name, do describe the colour afterwards.
Think about what someone who comes across your post knows and what they don't know. Don't assume that everyone is familiar with the same things as you.
Transcribe all text within the borders of the image 100% verbatim. (Sorry, I don't have any steadfast rules for text in foreign languages, for misspellings or other mistakes or for text that's unreadable in the image, but that you can read elsewhere and therefore transcribe.)
Do not use all-caps for words or entire sentences. Some screen readers will spell them out, letter by letter, even if that isn't your intention.
Do not use technical terms and/or jargon, no matter what you think people are or should be familiar with.
Do not mention a person's race. If at all, mention their skin tone (light-skinned, medium-light-skinned, medium-skinned, medium-dark-skinned, dark-skinned).
Do not mention a person's gender if you have to assume it. Only do it when a person actually performs their gender in an image, or that person has personally declared their gender to you, or you have a source of that person publicly declaring their gender, or you have a similarly rock-solid, undeniable source for that person's gender.
Do not add any information that is not available in the post text and/or the image itself. This includes explanations, image credits and license information. Not everyone can access alt-text. Some people have physical disabilities that prevent them from accessing alt-text. Any information that's only available in alt-text is inaccessible and lost to them.

#Long #LongPost #CWLong #CWLongPost #AltText #AltTextMeta #CWAltTextMeta #ImageDescription #ImageDescriptions #ImageDescriptionMeta #CWImageDescriptionMeta