I'm trying to make an existing FLEX application section-508-compliant, by getting it to work smoothly with the JAWS screen reader. It kinda sorta works, but one immediate problem is that when you first go to the login screen, your cursor ends up in the userid field, but JAWS doesn't read anything useful (like the label of the field you're in!) until you hit TAB or something.
Is there a way to force it to speak immediately on application startup, without making the user tab/backtab just to hear where they are?
For that matter, as cool as it is that it reads interactive controls as the user tabs around, sometimes you just need to make JAWS say something at a particular point in the logic, which might or might not be associated with a control, as if you could write AS code like jaws.speak('blah blah blah');. Does anyone know how to accomplish this?
check out the Tips and Tricks slide (page 16) on this page:
http://www.slideshare.net/fugaciousness/accessibility-in-flex
A few in particular you may find usefull...
start the tabIndex at 1 instead of 0.
Force focus into the app with ExternalInterface.call("s = function() {document.getElementByID('"+this.id+"').focus(); }");
Or force the tab to stay within the app... keyFocusChange="event.preventDefault(); focusManager.getNextFocusManagerComponent(event.shiftKey).setFocus()"
Related
I'm adding a blocking modal (ie one that covers the screen and prevents interaction while an API call is processing) to my company's design library.
As part of that, I modified our modal so that clicking on the grey backdrop will NOT hide the blocking modal, but I want to make sure that doesn't violate accessibility guidelines. I haven't been able to find anything online about this. Does anyone know if this this violates accessibility requirements?
Short Answer
The answer is 'it depends'. Basically if the modal is not dismissable in any way it becomes a 'keyboard trap' and so would violate WCAG.
However if you structure it correctly a modal that blocks the page while an API loads is perfectly valid (and can't be dismissed while the page is loading), but there are a few things you need to do to make sure this is accessible.
1. Make sure that when this modal loads, nothing else on the page is focusable.
The biggest issue I see on most modals is that they allow focus outside of them.
You can't just stop users using the tab key as that is not how most screen reader users navigate the page (they use shortcuts for headings (h1-h6), hyperlinks etc.).
For this reason make sure your modal sits outside of your <main> and the hide your <main> and other major landmarks that contain information with aria-hidden="true" and by adding tabindex="-1" to them so nothing is focusable.
Obviously this depends on your document structure so you would need to test it, but a properly structured HTML document will work with the above method.
2. Make sure that a screen reader user knows that the page is busy and something is loading.
There are a couple of ways to do this. The best is to use an aria-live region
Adding aria-live="polite" and aria-busy="true" to the section you are updating is one way (if you are updating one part of the page).
However in your circumstances I would make a section within the modal aria-live="assertive" and not use the aria-busy (as you will be hiding all the content in step 1 so aria-busy would not be applicable).
I would then update the message every second or two for long loads (i.e. 'loading', 'still loading', 'nearly loaded' etc. Or better yet a loading percentage if your script allows.)
Once the page content has loaded, you do not need to say 'loaded' instead make sure you have a heading for the section or page that has a tabindex="-1" added on it that accurately describes the content that has just been loaded in.
Once the load completes, programatically focus this heading and the user will know that the load is complete.
3. Make sure that if the API call fails you feed something meaningful back to screen readers
When your API call fails (notice I said when, not if!) make sure your JavaScript can handle this in a graceful way.
Provide a meaningful message within your modal aria-live region that explains the problem. Try to avoid stating error codes (or keep them short, nothing worse than hearing a 16 digit string on a screen reader for an error code), but instead keep it simple such as 'resource busy, try again later' or 'no data received, please try again' etc.
Within that region I would also add one or two buttons that allow to retry / go back / navigate to a new page depending on what is appropriate for your needs.
4. For long load times, let the user know what is happening.
I covered this in point 2 but just to emphasise it, make sure you feedback to users that things are still loading if there is a long load time by updating your aria-live region.
Nothing worse that wondering if the page has loaded and the developers forgot to tell you.
5. Give the option to cancel an API call so it doesn't become a keyboard trap.
Obviously the big problem with a whole page modal is it is a 'keyboard trap'.
To ensure this isn't an issue make sure you provide a cancel button.
Make sure it is clear that this will cancel the loading of the page, but don't rely on JavaScript alone.
Instead make this a <a> styled like a button that either points to the current page or the previous page (yet again depending on your needs) and add role="button".
Then intercept this click with JavaScript so that it can function like a button.
The reason for this is that when your JavaScript fails (yet again - when, not if) the user still has a way to get to a meaningful page, thus avoiding a keyboard trap.
This is one of the few times you should use an anchor as a button, as a fallback!
By doing this you ensure that the user always has a way to escape the modal.
You may also consider allowing a user to use the Esc key to close / cancel but that is yet again down to you and your circumstances.
I'm curious what's the proper way to push the screen read to read <span>read me on load</span> first (it's in the middle of the html page) when the page is loaded?
Even
role="rude"
doesn't help for some reason.
Thank you.
What you are using is not part of ARIA live regions. You want either role=alert or aria-live=assertive (though in an early draft "assertive" was originally "rude").
Now, that being said, live regions are intended for use on an already-loaded page. If you are making a dialog, then your HTML might look like this:
<div role="alert" aria-live="assertive">
Anything in here will be announced as soon as it changes.
</div>
If you want the dialog to be announced at page load, then consider hiding its contents and then using script to display its contents once the page has finished loading.
If you need to make it announce as soon as the page loads and it is not a dialog, consider moving focus to the element at page load using script. By placing focus, the browser will announce whatever it is.
For this to work, however, you cannot just place focus on a <span> as it is not interactive content. You can make it interactive by adding a tabindex attribute. If you do that, then you will need to add a role describing what the element does (you can use role=region if you are stuck) so that the screen reader can announce what it is instead making the user think she has landed on a control or otherwise expect to be able to take an action.
If you are moving focus to the element for users without screen readers, or if the very first thing the page displays at page load is an alert of some sort, then this should be fine.
However, since you have provided no context and no examples, and given all the ways this can be done that are far worse than doing nothing, please ask yourself this:
Is the thing you want to announce…
…an alert or dialog?
…a control that already can receive keyboard focus?
…going to be given focus for all users, not just those with screen readers?
If you end up saying no twice then you should not do this.
If you can provide an example URL that shows what you want to do, then I am happy to help you get it working. Otherwise I fear you may be coding something that ends up creating a trap or barrier for screen reader users.
Currently trying to make a section of a site more readable to screen readers (Jaws, MacVoice over, ect). One of the buttons on the page generates a popup that in turn the user will need to be notified of, the problem is this popup is generated at the bottom of the DOM meaning that the user would have to navigate to the bottom of the dom (tabbing through) in order to even know the page is there. Does anyone know a possible way around this?
You can try removing it from the generated place with javascript and append it to a more convienant/logic place for the user. The code should be something like:
$('#amoreconvenientplaceforthebuttonID').append($('#mybuttonID'));
$('#mybuttonID').remove();
this is insanely annoying problem:
AS3 full screen application based on ADOBE FLEX 4, text field. User types something in text field, and then starts clicking backspace many many times to remove what he just wrote, and for some reason, instead of removing characters from text field it tells browser to GO BACK and user navigates away. Why?! Please, please help, this is so terrible. My users are losing important unsaved this is data while using my application!
i am using safari browser
PLEASE HELP.
Wow, this is terrible, I am so irritated, it happens every single time
It is possible that the focus is lost from your text field when hitting the backspace multiple times (check if you are firing some events on the text field that may cause this), which causes the main window to take focus and trigger 'Back' on the browser.
The root of the problem is that the browser carries out keyboard shortcuts REGARDLESS of the flash app having the focus or not. From what I heard this problem does not exist on Safari's for Mac, only Safari for Windows.
I would check to see what browser you are in and then create a popup saying you this app does NOT work on Safari browser ON windows.
Scratching head*
Well maybe if HAD to solve this, I would use the ExternalInterface to interact with Safari or javascript to PREVENT the history back button from getting applied. So it won't go back to an old page. That is what I would look into.
Sometimes a user will click on a link on a page, and it seems that there is no reaction -- nothing is loaded. It turns out that all the links on that page is targeting a window name, such as "news_content". The user previously already clicked on a news headline, and so when the user now clicks on another news headline, that window (usually another tab nowadays) will load the news, but the original tab is still the one being shown. To the user, this seems like nothing is happening.
Are those websites using <a href=" ... " target="news_content"> ? Is it a good idea to use something like that, or can it be changed a little bit so that the focus will go to that tab instead of staying at the original tab?
(is it better that the browser always switch to the target tab? if so, then this problem looks like will be solved).
In my opinion the user should always be in control of whether a link opens in a new window or not - If they're anything like me with numerous tabs endless new windows links are a mess.
What you seem to be asking is why the browser stays at the original page when a tab is updated with content, its simple, it sees it as another webpage, say you had a page that had realtime updating, your browser would not switch to that as it sees you are on another page - for all it knows you could be reading an article, watching a video etc.
All it takes to realise a different tab/window has updated is a little bit of awareness. With windows they would generally open over the current content, however as tabs are in one window this is not possible an it remains closed, but updated.
EDIT: In response to the title... I believe it to be better practice than opening something brand new each time however feel it should be the users choice whether to load a single new tab or stay in the same one. Hope this helps.
One caveat to add to the conversation.
I only use target= when I know the content is destined to be in an iframe and I don't want the link click to stay in the small window.
For example the graphs I embed here : http://webnumbr.com/stackoverflow-questions
Link behaviour should generally be left to the user to control. In some situations, a case can be made for target="_blank" (especially now that Firefox, at least, has a "New pages should be opened in: A new tab" option), but setting all links to open in the same new window is just bad.
I, for example, hate waiting for pages to load, so I'll read down a page middle-clicking each link that interests me, which will queue them up in a series of new tabs. Five interesting links become five tabs, each loaded in the background while I'm reading the first article, so no waiting. If you make all five open in the same window/tab, though, then each one disappears when I call up the next and not only do I have to 'pick one, wait for it to load, read it, go back to the original article, repeat', but, if I don't notice that this is what's happening, then I'll also need to go back and make a second pass through the original page to re-find the links to the lost documents (or, more likely, just say "not worth my time" and never read them).
Forcing newly-opened tags to the front has a similar problem: I opened it in a new tab because I want it to load in the background while I continue reading the original document. Don't subvert my intention. I cleared the "When I open a new tab, switch to it immediately" checkbox for a reason.
Yes, these websites are using target. Well. I can't imagine in which set of circumstances using the target attribute may be useful. But perhaps there's one. I haven't come across it.
Look, always switching to another tab solves the problem you describe, but it creates others. The biggest one is that switching to another tab may come as a surprise. Usability is by and large about never surprising the user. By the way, I greatly enjoyed the book "Don't make me think."