Alternative Text in XHTML:-


Sometimes a visitor to your Web site can't see your images. A visitor may use a text-only browser, such as Lynx; use a speech synthesizer; or surf the Web with the browser's option to auto-load images turned off (which can be done in both Internet Explorer and Navigator). Fortunately, XHTML allows you to provide alternative text for your images.

What should be entered as alternative text? You should enter a short, concise description of the image or the destination or action to be taken if the graphic serves as a link. If you had a photo of a widget to be used with a specific gadget, your alternative text could read "Widget 1 for use with Gadget 202." You could create that text by using the following syntax:

<img src="widget1.gif" alt="Widget 1 for use with Gadget 202" />

For images of purely decorative treatment, such as small bullets or other accents that don't provide information or navigation, an empty alt attribute—alt=""—should be used. Speech readers and other browsers that rely on alt content then know they can safely ignore those images.