accessibility caption proposal comments

[Bruce D'Arcus <bruce.darcus@OpenDocument.us>]

While it's fresh in my mind, I realize that I never did lay out my 
concern about the caption proposal, first asking for clarification 
here:

<http://lists.oasis-open.org/archives/office/200605/msg00015.html>

In general, I think examples like captions are where the accessibility 
SC has identified some structural weaknesses in ODF that have broader 
implications. These are partly legacy from heavily 
presentation-oriented traditions in word-processors, but traditions I 
strongly believe we need to evolve ODF away from. The problems include 
captions, but also more difficult issues like sections, where sectional 
breaks can only be inferred awkwardly. I'd like to see us move towards 
more structural rigor in general; more XHTML 2.0 than 1.0.

Anyway, to get to my point on the caption proposal, I recognize that 
adding an attribute link is a fairly painless solution, but I also 
think it's not a good long-term one, not only because it will conflict 
with the efforts of the metadata SC.

My suggestion would instead be to use natural containment, and to add a 
caption element to ODF 1.2; e.g.

<text:p>
    <draw:frame>  <!-- outer frame -->
      <draw:text-box>
        <draw:frame>
          <draw:image>
            <office:binary-data>picture data 
here....</office:binary-data>
            <text:caption>Caption Text</text:caption>
          </draw:image>
        </draw:frame>
      </draw:text-box>
    </draw:frame>
</text:p>

Bruce