Situation A: If a short description can serve the same purpose and present the same information as the non-text content:

1. G94: Providing short text alternative for non-text content that serves the same purpose and presents the same information as the non-text content using a short text alternative technique listed below

Situation B: If a short description can not serve the same purpose and present the same information as the non-text content (e.g., a chart or diagram):

1. G95: Providing short text alternatives that provide a brief description of the non-text content using a short text alternative technique listed below AND one of the following techniques for long description:

   • G92: Providing long description for non-text content that serves the same purpose and presents the same information using a long text alternative technique listed below

   • G74: Providing a long description in text near the non-text content, with a reference to the location of the long description in the short description

   • G73: Providing a long description in another location with a link to it that is immediately adjacent to the non-text content

Situation C: If non-text content is a control or accepts user input:

1. G82: Providing a text alternative that identifies the purpose of the non-text content using a short text alternative technique listed below

2. H44: Using label elements to associate text labels with form controls (HTML)

3. H65: Using the title attribute to identify form controls when the label element cannot be used (HTML)

4. FLASH32: Using auto labeling to associate text labels with form controls (Flash)

5. FLASH29: Setting the label property for form components (Flash)

6. FLASH25: Labeling a form control by setting its accessible name (Flash)

7. FLASH30: Specifying accessible names for image buttons (Flash)

8. FLASH27: Providing button labels that describe the purpose of a button (Flash)

9. FLASH6: Creating accessible hotspots using invisible buttons (Flash)

10. SL18: Providing Text Equivalent for Nontext Silverlight Controls With AutomationProperties.Name (Silverlight)

11. SL26: Using LabeledBy to Associate Labels and Targets in Silverlight (Silverlight)

12. SL30: Using Silverlight Control Compositing and AutomationProperties.Name (Silverlight)

Situation D: If non-text content is time-based media (including live video-only and live audio-only); a test or exercise that would be invalid if presented in text; or primarily intended to create a specific sensory experience:

1. Providing a descriptive label using a short text alternative technique listed below

2. G68: Providing a descriptive labelshort text alternative that describes the purpose of live audio-only and live video-only content using a short text alternative technique listed below

3. G100: Providing a short text alternative which is the accepted name or a descriptive name of the non-text content using a short text alternative technique listed below

Situation E: If non-text content is a CAPTCHA:

1. G143: Providing a text alternative that describes the purpose of the CAPTCHA AND G144: Ensuring that the Web Page contains another CAPTCHA serving the same purpose using a different modality

Situation F: If the non-text content should be ignored by assistive technology:

1. Implementing or marking the non-text content so that it will be ignored by assistive technology using one of the technology-specific techniques listed below

   • H67: Using null alt text and no title attribute on img elements for images that AT should ignore (HTML)

   • C9: Using CSS to include decorative images (CSS)

   • FLASH3: Marking objects in Flash so that they can be ignored by AT (Flash)

   • PDF4: Hiding decorative images with the Artifact tag in PDF documents (PDF)

Short text alternative techniques for use in sufficient techniques above

1. H36: Using alt attributes on images used as submit buttons (HTML)

2. H2: Combining adjacent image and text links for the same resource (HTML)

3. H37: Using alt attributes on img elements (HTML)

4. H35: Providing text alternatives on applet elements (HTML)

5. FLASH1: Setting the name property for a non-text object (Flash)

6. PDF1: Applying text alternatives to images with the Alt entry in PDF documents (PDF)

7. H53: Using the body of the object element (HTML)

8. H24: Providing text alternatives for the area elements of image maps (HTML)

9. H86: Providing text alternatives for ASCII art, emoticons, and leetspeak (HTML)

10. FLASH28: Providing text alternatives for ASCII art, emoticons, and leetspeak in Flash (Flash)

11. H30: Providing link text that describes the purpose of a link for anchor elements (HTML)

    Note: See Understanding Success Criterion 2.4.4 Link Purpose (In Context).

12. G196: Using a text alternative on one item within a group of images that describes all items in the group

13. FLASH5: Combining adjacent image and text buttons for the same resource (Flash)

14. SL5: Defining a Focusable Image Class for Silverlight (Silverlight)

Long text alternative techniques for use in sufficient techniques above

1. H45: Using longdesc (HTML)

2. H53: Using the body of the object element (HTML)

3. FLASH2: Setting the description property for a non-text object in Flash (Flash)

4. FLASH11: Providing a longer text description of an object (Flash)

5. SL8: Displaying HelpText in Silverlight User Interfaces (Silverlight)

General Techniques for Informative Non-Text Content (Advisory)

• Identifying informative non-text content (future link)

• Keeping short descriptions short (future link)

• Describing images that include text (future link)

• Providing a longer description of the non-text content where only a descriptive label is required using a technology-specific technique (for an accessibility-supported content technology) for long description listed above (future link)

• Providing different sizes for non-text content when it cannot have an equivalent accessible alternative (future link)

• Using server-side scripts to resize images of text (future link)

General Techniques for Live Non-Text Content (Advisory)

• Linking to textual information that provides comparable information (e.g., for a traffic Webcam, a municipality could provide a link to the text traffic report.) (future link)

General techniques to minimize the barrier of CAPTCHAs

• Providing more than two modalities of CAPTCHAs (future link)

• Providing access to a human customer service representative who can bypass CAPTCHA (future link)

• Not requiring CAPTCHAs for authorized users (future link)

HTML Techniques (Advisory)

• H46: Using noembed with embed (HTML)

• Writing for browsers that do not support frame (future link)

• Providing alternative content for iframe (future link)

• H27: Providing text and non-text alternatives for object (HTML)

• Not using long descriptions for iframe (future link)

• Providing redundant text links for client-side image maps (future link)

CSS Techniques (Advisory)

• C18: Using CSS margin and padding rules instead of spacer images for layout design (CSS)

• Using CSS background, :before or :after rules for decorative images instead of img elements (future link)

• Displaying empty table cells (future link)

WAI-ARIA Techniques (Advisory)

• Using the ARIA presentation role to indicate elements are purely presentational (future link)

Silverlight Techniques (Advisory)

• SL19: Providing User Instructions With AutomationProperties.HelpText in Silverlight (Silverlight)

Metadata Techniques (Advisory)

• Using metadata to associate text transcriptions with a video (future link)

• Using metadata to associate text transcriptions with audio-only content (future link)

  • EXAMPLE: Providing, in metadata, URI(s) that points to an audio description and a text transcript of a video.

  • EXAMPLE: Providing, in metadata, URI(s) that point to several text transcripts (English, French, Dutch) of an audio file.