Title, Alt or Both?

[blueocto]

When creating a linked image, what is the best/your preferred way of naming?

Should there be a title tag for when you mouseover, and an alt tag for screen-readers et al?
Or is it not that important? Is it relevant to SEO?

example:

<a href="www.mydomain.com" title="My Image"><img src="images/myimage.jpg" alt="My Text" /></a>

[Harry]

alt explains image, title explains link. Ergo, use both. However, depends whether you should be using an image or not anyway.

All images require an alt attribute (this can be empty) but is the image a graphical way of saying something textual? If yes then it should be text with the image applied using CSS. If it is for example a thumbnail of a photo which links to a larger version, this should be an inline image.

[blueocto]

Thanks for the clarification Harry - it doesn't surprise me you got here first

[Harry]

I smelt something in the air Caroline, it had a faint whiff of… semantics. lol

[blueocto]

hehe I definitely think you've been sniffing something! :-P

[Imagn]

Future changes to accessibility guidelines (UAAG) may actually require both in the future.

[JimBim]

it is better to use both

[ddwebguru]

I only use alt tag with images because crawler can only read them. Why use title because it does not have any value.

[Harry]

I only use alt tag with images because crawler can only read them. Why use title because it does not have any value.

Title on the link, not the image. And if your only consideration is 'crawlers' when marking things up then I think you seriously need to reconsider your practices. Both the title and alt attribute are for accessibility, not SEO or anything like that.