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Re: What's wrong with this registration form?

for

From: Steve Green
Date: Jul 15, 2008 1:30PM

That is just the most disgusting site from a web standards / accessibility
viewpoint. As you say, the whole thing is a Flash movie including the
registration form. This is plain stupidity. Flash-based forms can sometimes
be reasonably accessible, but this one isn't. The only good news is that it
can be navigated with a keyboard, so you have a chance of using it with a
screen reader even if the form controls are not announced.

After the Zip code the focus moves to a combobox where you select the
gender. I don't have JAWS installed at the moment but I suspect you can use
the arrow key to select an option even if it does not read it to you. There
are only two options, the first being Male, and the second Female.

After that there is an opt-in checkbox that you probably want to uncheck
using the spacebar, and after that there is a Terms of Use checkbox that you
need to check. After that the focus moves to the Continue button, which can
also be operated using the spacebar.

If you don't fill in the data correctly an error message will appear but I
suspect that you will have no way of knowing this. When this happens the
focus is on the OK button so you can just hit the spacebar to clear it, then
go through the form and sort out the error.

There is only the one registration page, and if you fill in the correct data
you will be registered. However, as you say, the user experience is going to
be very poor.

Steve