Is the title attribute discouraged?

[ddbeck]

This is an interesting boundary case for discouraged (also known as deprecated, see #2388), prompted by the authoring of title-attr in #2423.

From the spec:

Relying on the title attribute is currently discouraged as many user agents do not expose the attribute in an accessible manner as required by this specification (e.g., requiring a pointing device such as a mouse to cause a tooltip to appear, which excludes keyboard-only users and touch-only users, such as anyone with a modern phone or tablet).

Should we interpret this to mean that the title global HTML attribute is a discouraged feature?

I think we should discuss the question here, make a decision, and then (as a nice-to-have) file an issue with WHATWG, asking them to revising the note to clarify this point, so it's no longer a boundary case.

[ddbeck]

My take: I think it's probably not discouraged, but only barely. The admonition here seems to say to not rely on the attribute, rather than to not use the attribute. That is, I've interpreted it as meaning it's not OK to use it alone, but it's OK to use it alongside alt text and captions and so on.

But this is a pretty conditional reading; I don't think it would be unreasonable to take the note as a general admonition against using the title attribute in new content.

[captainbrosset]

and then (as a nice-to-have) file an issue with WHATWG, asking them to revising the note to clarify this point, so it's no longer a boundary case.

I would actually start this now, and not add a discouraged flag on the web-feature before the spec editors and WG participants have had time to come to a conclusion.
This note has seemingly been in the spec since at least 2012 (see this commit). It's fair to assume that it's not been a topic of recent conversation on the WG, and I'd love to hear from the WG directly what they think the note means exactly. Is it discouraged to even use the attribute? Or is it discouraged to use it as the sole accessibility technique for an image or a link, but otherwise fine to use for other things?

[ddbeck]

Good idea, @captainbrosset. I've sent whatwg/html#10875.