Best practice: Descriptions vs. Annotations

[Drew Lewis]

I have recently started converting images in one of our PreTeXt books to Prefigure, and have been making use of the annotations so that users can explore the diagrams with their keyboard instead of just visually.  I am a little unclear as to what are the best practices for using <description> and <shortdescription> in PreTeXt are when the figure is annotated, as the annotations are conveying whatever information I might write in a description but in a better, more hierarchical way.  I do kind of like how if I use a <description> with an image, then I see a visual indicator that this is there and it is easily available to sighted readers as well.  Thus, I am particularly wondering if it might make sense to reuse the top level (ref="figure") annotation as a <description> or <shortdescription> in PreTeXt (but then wondering if this could/should be done automatically)---or if repeating such information would actually make it harder for readers who are exploring the annotations.

Any guidance would be most welcome!

Thanks,
Drew

[Rob Beezer]

Just one data point. We would use #shortdescription and/or #description in a conversion to braille. Of course, PreFigure would provide a tactile diagram, but I think a written description and a tactile version would be useful together. Perhaps not fully implemented right now.

Maybe someday a conversion to LaTeX would make use of this in an accessible way.

Navigating with annotations in a web browser is deluxe, but we build other stuff too.

More to your point - not sure there are yet any comprehensive Best Practices. You are a trailblazer.

Rob