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Re: Is a label element helpful here?

for

From: David Farough
Date: Jun 29, 2010 10:51AM

Hi Celeste:

It would be better if the updated values were written directly into the
last cell of the table. You are right, since user input is not required
for this field it would be better if that field was not an edit field in
the tab order. I found on occasion, that I sometimes got stuck in this
area and that pressing tab did not take me to the next user input field
in cell 1 of the table. Instead I was going to the cell below the
update value.

another thing I should point out is that if you are going to have this
as an edit field, that it should be a read only edit field. This way, a
user will not inadvertently erase the highlighted value.

This table was coded properly so that moving from cell to cell would
cause the screen reader to speak the column header as well as the text
contained in the cell.

My screen reader was speaking the updated values in Cell 3 if I moved
back up a row after tabbing to the next user input area.
However in earlier versions of Jaws, the user needs to turn off forms
mode before moving up to the updated data.

David Farough
Application Accessibility Coordinator/coordonateur de l'accessibilité
Information Technology Services Directorate /
Direction des services d'information technologiques
Public Service Commission / Commission de la fonction publique
Email / Courriel: <EMAIL REMOVED>
Tel. / Tél: (613) 992-2779

>>> Celeste Mackintosh < <EMAIL REMOVED> > 06:57 PM
Monday, June 28, 2010 >>>

Hi everyone,

I'm looking at making a tool like this one
http://maine.gov/msl/services/calculator.htm for our library (this is
a free tool available through the American Library Association, created
by the Massachusetts Library Association).

My question is, since in the last column of this table/form, user input
isn't actually what's being sought, is having a label element here
helpful? Here's an example of a row - check out the final table cell to
see the input I'm talking about:

<tr>
<td><input type="text" name="child" id="child" size="5"
onchange="doCalculator()" tabindex="3" /></td>
<td><label for="child">Children Books
Borrowed</label></td>
<td><label for="childResult">$
<input type="text" id="childResult" size="5"
value="0.00" /></label></td>
</tr>

We're also going to link to a non-javascript straight table of relative
values or a spreadsheet. Does this last label element need to be there?
Having the label element for the first input seems useful, since it
means a wider area where people can click to get access to that input,
but the last one the label seems not so helpful...

Any help would be really appreciated! :)

Many thanks,

Celeste