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Re: Screen readers and telephone numbers

for

From: Raleigh Way
Date: Mar 3, 2003 3:30PM

I haven't tried this because I don't have Jaws installed, but would
the accronym, abbr or possibly some other hack of the title tag be
made to read the numbers as individual digits? For example:

Telephone <acronym title="1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 4">123-456-1234</acronym>
Telephone <abbr title="1 2 3 4 5 6 1 2 3 4">123-456-1234</abbr>

Even though the screen reader would read the initial grouping of
numbers as continuous, it might speak the digits separately. A
little sloppy, but it might prove useful if it works.

Raleigh Way





>On Monday, March 3, 2003, at 09:25 AM, Paul Bohman wrote:
>
>>Ideally screen readers would be able to recognize phone numbers. Home Page
>>Reader *does* read phone numbers correctly (pronouncing each number
>>individually). Window Eyes does not. I don't believe JAWS does either, but I
>>don't currently have it installed.
>>
>
>Actually, recognition of phone numbers can be difficult when you factor in
>international numbers.
>
>I would say instead that "ideally, screen readers would support Aural style
>sheets."
>
>The speak-numeral CSS property is intended to address this very question:
>
>http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS2/aural.html#propdef-speak-numeral
>
> 'speak-numeral'
>
> Value: digits | continuous | inherit
> Initial: continuous
> Applies to: all elements
> Inherited: yes
> Percentages: N/A
> Media: aural
>
> This property controls how numerals are spoken. Values have
> the following meanings:
>
> digits
> Speak the numeral as individual digits. Thus, "237" is
> spoken "Two Three Seven".
>
> continuous
> Speak the numeral as a full number. Thus, "237" is
> spoken "Two hundred thirty seven". Word
> representations are language-dependent.
>
>Unfortunately, no screen readers support this, and even more unfortunately,
>the W3C has taken steps away from encouraging Aural CSS implementation
>and use with the issuance of CSS 2.1.
>
>As a stopgap measure, you could do something like this, in supported CSS
>and HTML:
>
><span class="auralspacer"> </span>5<span class="auralspacer"> </span>5-<span
>class="auralspacer"> </span>1<span class="auralspacer"> </span>2<span
>class="auralspacer"> </span>1<span class="auralspacer"> </span>2
>
>..auralspacer { display: none; }
>
>@media all {
> .auralspacer { display: inline; } }
>
>@media screen {
> .auralspacer { display: none; } }
>
>@media print {
> .auralspacer { display: none; } }
>
>In theory, this would make the markup look like this:
>
>5 5 5- 1 2 1 2
>
>Which hopefully would be read as "five five five one two one two".
>
>But when displayed on the screen or printed, it would look like this:
>
>555-1212
>
>Nassssty nassssty hack. But that's what happens when you don't have
>support for good and necessary standards, such as Aural CSS. In ACSS,
>you'd just do this:
>
><span class="phonenumber">555-1212</span>
>
>..phonenumber { speak-numeral: digits; }
>
>--Kynn
>
>
>----
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