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Re: Focus for error messages

for

From: Joshue O Connor
Date: Apr 19, 2007 8:00AM

JAWS in forms mode is actually JAWS interacting directly with the web
interface/application itself. Otherwise the screen reader is interacting
with a virtual version of the page via the OSM (Off Screen Model). Many
screen readers use these methods and some interact directly through the
DOM such as Supernova/HAL.

tedd said:
> you use a new window to show error messages, then that will be provided to screen readers.

Thats one way but this may not always be ideal. Also, if the DOM is
being manipulated then these error messages may not be displayed at all
as the page is not refreshed when dynamically manipulating the DOM. You
may be able to trigger page refresh etc but I suppose this goes against
the grain of dynamically generating content on the fly a la AJAX.

> if you initiate a screen refresh of the current window, then whatever errors that are new on that page (via ajax) will be made accessible to screen readers as well.

Could you please expand a little on how you suggest that will work?

Ben pointed to some good resources earlier including his example and
Gez's article, which are really useful.

The real trick to give the error message focus within your interface and
in order to do that you need to provide an element that can receive
focus such as an anchor/link.

Cheers

Josh


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