if alt tag...??

Question

Is the alt tag still being used by some of the engines or any main directory?

Answer 1

Yes, it is being used and the alt attribute should be used by web page designers and authors.

It should be put in with the end user in mind, accurately describing the topical relevancy of the image it's being put in for. Keywords and/or keyword phrases are fine. Whatever is legitimately for the benefit of users who may not be using images for browsing (like the visuallyh impaired) can be expected to pass scrutiny if hand examined, which imho is the ultimate test of viability.

That doesn't mean putting whole paragraphs of text into alt text when a page is all images is OK.

Answer 2

Sure this should be worked, at least the possibility set the "title" attribute of anchors, if wanted/needed (it should not be an obligation) and "alt" attribute should be mandatory for images (even if it is empty..). Anyways you should create an issue for this in my opinion, that patch (for a bug!) still needs to be reviewed before maybe being committed. Making this issue a feature request won't help to correct that bug.