MadCowKastorJan 23, 2025
Eugen Rochko
With today's update, we've improved the look of the alt text modal you see when composing new posts on #Mastodon, and added some information about the significance of alt text for accessibility and how to write it.
Jan 23, 2025 at 5:12pmWeb
Show threadjforJan 23, 2025

@Gargron

Why is this so?

Plus it opens in a new window

Show threadMatt WilcoxJan 23, 2025
@fae2535 Because that's how federation works. Your own server may not have seen all the responses from other servers yet. It's a technical limitation of not being a centralised service.
Show threadjforJan 23, 2025

@mattwilcox

Thank you for the answer

Show threadMatt WilcoxJan 23, 2025

@fae2535 No worries. It's one of those quirks of the platform - it's not obvious why it'd be that way.

Mastodon isn't "one giant thing" like Twitter. When you post, it takes time for other servers to know about it. Same for replies to posts. Not all servers know about each other, so replies from one of those places might be missing for you - unless you go to the same server as the person who's post you're looking at.

TLDR: A nerdy weirdness of the system.

Show threadjforJan 23, 2025

@mattwilcox

It usedn't to be like that.
I feel that it changed between yesterday and today. But not sure. Thanks!

Show thread๐ŸŒธ lily ๐Ÿณ๏ธโ€โšง๏ธ   ฮธฮ” โ‹ & โˆžJan 23, 2025
@fae2535 @Gargron since the post is not on your server, mstdn.social, it's actually on mastodon.social, so the post might have some replies your server is unaware of.

it opened in a new window because it opened mastodon.social, but maybe you didn't notice because mstdn.social and mastodon.social look very similar. if you open my post (in the ... menu, there will be an option called something like "open external post"), you will see it looks very different. this is because i don't use mastodon
Show threadSBartsch โœ…Jan 23, 2025
@Gargron Danke ๐Ÿ™ Deine/eure Arbeit ist so wichtig (gerade in der aktuellen Lage) 
Show threadResolviendo la incรณgnita ๐ŸŒJan 23, 2025
@Gargron Great. I saw it yesterday. There wasn't any rectangle covering part of the image.
Show threadLazarou Monkey Terror ๐Ÿš€๐Ÿ’™๐ŸŒˆJan 23, 2025
@Gargron it's nice, thanks ๐Ÿ‘
Show threadJeri DanskyJan 23, 2025
@Gargron If the image is a relatively short text block, why would you summarize it rather than just including the exact text?
Show threadStefan BohacekJan 23, 2025
@Gargron Very nice!
Show threadLaurent CimonJan 23, 2025
@Gargron I know he doesnโ€™t have internet but thank John Mastodon for me next time you see him
Show threadqueer as in fuck your bordersJan 23, 2025
@Gargron "Summarize text in images" is not good practice for alt text!
Show threadDanny Jan 23, 2025
@Gargron I'm guessing this is just for mobile apps, because I'm not seeing an update on Github
Show threadwebhatJan 23, 2025
@Gargron it's not just for visual impairment. Someone writing AltText also enables someone who can't understand the language which is in the image to translate it to a language they do understand
Show threadJulio J. ๐Ÿ€ฒJan 23, 2025
@webhat @Gargron it also helps to understand cultural references that may be lost for people from different places or backgrounds.
Show threadStefan BohacekJan 23, 2025
@j3j5 @webhat @Gargron Yeah, this is explained in the pop-up, but it would be helpful to include it in the placeholder text as well.
Show threadFubaroqueJan 23, 2025
@Gargron Itโ€™s difficult to close the popup. Do you really intend that I scroll to the next toot and click there to make it go away? How about just clicking on the popup to close it? That seems a reasonable choice.
Show threadEugen RochkoJan 23, 2025
@fubaroque Are you referring to the popout pictured in the screenshot? I'm not sure how that fits in with scrolling. There is no scrolling on the modal dialog nor is there a next post to scroll to. You can click anywhere to close it again.
Show threadFubaroqueJan 23, 2025

@Gargron Indeed how am I supposed to close it? The only way I found is scroll to the next toot and click there.

Like I said how about closing it when I click on the popup itself?

Show threadPeter Saathoff-HarshfieldJan 23, 2025
@Gargron Someone else said this too, but if there is text in an image, that exact text should be in the alt text, not just a summary of it.
Show threadFiXatoJan 23, 2025

@Gargron too bad the input text area only mentions visual impairment as a reason, and doesn't also mention the "low-bandwidth connections, or those seeking extra context" that's included in the help text, though it's a good start. :)

Though, as others have already pointed out, it's usually better that text in images is included in full, rather than merely summarised

Furthermore, the help text modal is lacking scroll support when the text is larger than for example the user's phone screen. The only way for me to scroll the text into view in this example recording, was to scroll outside the modal, which imho is counter-intuitive and requires the user to actually be able to reach the background.

It could also do with a proper close button within the modal to hide said help text, as for some users it seems this modal takes up just about the entire screen space.

I realise all this info is better added to a GitHub issue, but I currently don't have the spoons for this. Others are welcome to copy this text and attached video in a support ticket should they wish to do so.

Show threaduwu1baJan 23, 2025
@Gargron alt text still allows for more characters than post itself.
Show threaduwu1baJan 23, 2025
@Gargron at this point, if I will ever use mastodon again, it would be easier to post 1x1 image and use alt text as a body
Show threadGiselleJan 24, 2025
@Gargron
This is great. I like the focus on summarising, I feel that's a really good approach.
It's much more interesting to me to read/hear what is relevant to the original poster, rather than all little details that can become overwhelming. Thank you for the update.