[thelist] hidden form field anti-spam tool?

[Matt Warden]

On 4/18/07, Joel D Canfield <joel at streamliine.com> wrote:
> > Potential downsides would be screen readers (depending on how it was
> > hidden)
>
> makes sense; what methods are there for hiding other than CSS's 'display:none' and what's the best option for considering screen readers?
>

display:none is actually what you want here. We're trying to hide it
from screen readers as well.

> > and users with CSS disabled.
>
> and maybe this makes the previous question moot: this could be dealt with by making it a valid but random field (like, I think Hassan? does, 'put a two here [ ]') if they disable CSS intentionally, I suspect they're used to/expecting a different experience from those who leave it enabled.
>

I think it's a good trade off, unless your audience is likely to have
CSS disabled or unsupported.

That said, I would think you'd have to name the field something tricky
like 'email', unless bots are dumb enough to just fill out every form
field. And, if they are that dumb and this defeat catches on, then
that dumbness won't last long.

-- 
Matt Warden
Cleveland, OH, USA
http://mattwarden.com


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