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Re: evaluating accessibility with WCAG 2.0 (Angela French)

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From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Apr 11, 2011 12:00PM

Hi

At lesat my set up of Jaws 12 and IE8 inserts a new line before links re read.
So, if I create a link of links and put | between the linka (anchor
tags) Jaws put the | on a new line between each link, except, for some
strange reason, after the first link, where the | actually is on the
same line, but after the link.
For all other links you get a link on a line by it self followed by a
| on the following line.
This is from a document that did not use any paragraphs or any other
tags, just the a tag, the closing a tag and | in between links.
Weird.
Thanks
-Birkir

On 4/11/11, Accessibility India < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> Awesome discussion. I'd like to know how screen reader users
> experience the <p> tag. Is it transparent? Does it have semantic
> meaning? Do you expect
> a certain content when you encounter one? I am a sighted user. But
> to me, harkening back to early days of elementary school grammar, a
> paragraph is a
> distinct portion of writing that contains a particular thought or
> idea, and consists of at least one sentence, usually more. If a <p>
> tag has that same
> meaning to a screen reader user, wouldn't a bunch of hyperlinked words
> separated by a pipe be a nonsense sentence?
>
> For a screen reader such as JAWS a blank line is encountered before
> and after the paragraph i.e <p>. Alternately by using the short-cut
> "p" with JAWS you can jump from one para to another. With NVDA you
> cannot find much different with <p> tag. I tried using the short-cut
> "p" on webpage with NVDA but cannot find any any paragraphs.
> So if the user wants to jump from one paragraph to another they can
> use short-cut p. Its not possible <p> tag is used. I recommend to use
> scemantic HTML.
> -----Original Message-----
> From:
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
> On Behalf Of Andrew Kirkpatrick
> Sent: Monday, April 11, 2011 5:31 AM
> To: WebAIM Discussion List
> Subject: [UCE] Re: [WebAIM] evaluating accessibility with WCAG 2.0
> (Angela French)
> Importance: Low
>
> I find myself wondering where to draw the line. If the argument for
> the use of a list for any set of related links is based on the need
> for users to know
> that a set of items are in a group and how many items are in that
> group then perhaps lists should be used more - cnn.com has story after
> story on their
> home page, do we recommend that the story titles and short teaser
> blurbs be encased in a list item and the group of stories be marked up
> as a list? This
> would help people know how many stories there are, why don't we do
> this? Or even within a story, there may be nine paragraphs that are
> related information
> that is supposed to be presented in an ordered fashion - perhaps we
> need to put each paragraph into a list item and make the story an
> ordered list? Of
> course, I'm being deliberately difficult but I think that we may be
> overstating the importance of embedding simple sets of links into
> semantic lists and
> running the risk of creating an unnecessarily verbose audio UI for audio
> users.
>
> Looking around, people that you'd think would be in tune with end-user
> needs seem perfectly content without using OL or UL for sets of
> links...
>
> Freedom Scientific's navigation bar:
> <p class="navp"><a href="/default.asp"> Home </a> <img
> src="/images/vline.gif" alt=""><a href="/product-portal.asp" >
> Products </a><img src="/images/vline.gif"
> alt="" ><a href="/purchase.asp"> Purchase </a><img
> src="/images/vline.gif" alt=""><a href="/support.asp"> Support
> </a><img src="/images/vline.gif" alt=""><a
> href="/training.asp"> Training </a><img src="/images/vline.gif"
> alt=""><a href="/about/about.asp"> About Us </a><img
> src="/images/vline.gif" alt=""><a
> href="/about/vision-facts.asp"> Low Vision Facts </a></p>
>
> GW-Micro's navbar:
> <A HREF="#mainHeadingTitle" STYLE="position: absolute; left: -1000px;
> font-size: 0px;">Skip to Main Content</A><A CLASS="navBarLink"
> HREF="/Window-Eyes"
> onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';" >Window-Eyes</A>&nbsp;<IMG
> SRC="/images/white_bullet.gif" ALT="" ALIGN="bottom">&nbsp;<A
> CLASS="navBarLink" HREF="/Notetakers"
> onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';" >Notetakers</A>&nbsp;<IMG
> SRC="/images/white_bullet.gif"
> ALT="" ALIGN="bottom">&nbsp;<A CLASS="navBarLink"
> HREF="/DAISY_Readers" onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';"
>>DAISY Readers</A>&nbsp;<IMG SRC="/images/white_bullet.gif" ALT=""
>> ALIGN="bottom">&nbsp;<A CLASS="navBarLink" HREF="/Braille_Displays"
>> onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';" >Braille
> Displays</A>&nbsp;<IMG SRC="/images/white_bullet.gif" ALT=""
> ALIGN="bottom">&nbsp;<A CLASS="navBarLink"
> HREF="/Low_Vision" onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';" >Low Vision</A>&nbsp;<IMG
> SRC="/images/white_bullet.gif"
> ALT="" ALIGN="bottom">&nbsp;<A CLASS="navBarLink" HREF="/Support"
> onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';" >Support</A>&nbsp;<IMG
> SRC="/images/white_bullet.gif" ALT="" ALIGN="bottom">&nbsp;<A
> CLASS="navBarLink" HREF="/Training"
> onMouseOver="this.style.color='#230E75';"
> onMouseOut="this.style.color='#FFFFFF';"
>>Training</A>
>
> National Federation of the Blind navbar:
> <div id="HomeMenu"><a href> "http://www.nfb.org/nfb/About_the_NFB.asp?SnID=1950147763"
>><img src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_About.gif" alt="About NFB"
>> width="128" height="38" border="0"></a><img
>> src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_MeniDivider.gif"
> width="1" height="38" alt="Line"><a href> "http://www.nfb.org/nfb/Info_About_Vision_Loss_For.asp?SnID=1950147763"
>><img src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_Information.gif" alt="Information
>> About Vision Loss For" width="169" height="38" border="0"></a><img
>> src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_MeniDivider.gif"
> width="1" height="38" alt="Line"><a href> "http://www.nfb.org/nfb/Members.asp?SnID=1950147763"
>><img src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_Members.gif" alt="Members"
>> width="103" height="38" border="0"></a><img
>> src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_MeniDivider.gif"
> width="1" height="38" alt="Line"><a href> "http://www.nfb.org/nfb/Resources.asp?SnID=1950147763"
>><img src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_Resources.gif" alt="Resources"
>> width="117" height="38" border="0"></a><img
>> src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_MeniDivider.gif"
> width="1" height="38" alt="Line"><a href> "http://www.nfb.org/nfb/Products_and_Technology.asp?SnID=1950147763"
>><img src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_Products.gif" alt="Products and
>> Technology" width="114" height="38" border="0"></a><img
>> src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_MeniDivider.gif"
> width="1" height="38" alt="Line"><a href> "http://www.nfb.org/nfb/Publications.asp?SnID=1950147763"
>><img src="/images/nfb/Template/NFBHome_Publications.gif" alt="Publications"
>> width="127" height="38" border="0"></a></div>
>
> American Council of the Blind nav:
> <p><font size="-2">
> [<A HREF="index.html">ACB Home</A> |
>
> <A HREF="profile.html">About ACB</A> |
> <A HREF="washington/index.html">Washington Connection</A> | <A
> HREF="magazine/index.html">Braille Forum</A> | <A HREF> "http://acb.org/store/index.php?option=com_content&;view=article&id=11&Itemid=14"
>>Donate to ACB</A> | <br> <A HREF="affiliates/index.html">Affiliates</A> |
>> <A HREF="resources/index.html">Helpful Resources</A> |
>
> <a href="conference/index.html">Conference and Convention</a> | <a href> "http://acb.org/store/index.html"
>>ACB Store</a> ] </font></p>
>
> Worth noting that AFB and RNIB both use lists widely.
>
> On Zeldman.com, there are items that seem like lists, but are not
> marked up as such:
> e.g. "Filed under: A Book Apart, A List Apart, content, content
> strategy, Design, E-Books, editorial, Education, wordpress"
>
> Same thing on the Yahoo! Accessibility blog:
> "Tags: assistive technology, Closed Captions, Deaf, hard of hearing,
> sean zdenek, Television"
>
> My gut is that we are calling things lists when the design aspects of
> web development work make it easy to do so, and that the connection to
> what users
> need is not clearly identified. I'd really like to see a description
> of what content types belong in lists and to what level of complexity
> an author should
> pursue in achieving that goal. Until we have that, when I see a set
> of links that are marked up inline within a simple paragraph I can't
> justify calling
> it a 1.3.1 failure.
>
> Thanks,
> AWK
>
> Andrew Kirkpatrick
> Group Product Manager, Accessibility
> Adobe Systems
>
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
> http://twitter.com/awkawk
> http://blogs.adobe.com/accessibility
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From:
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
> On Behalf Of Jason Kiss
> Sent: Monday, April 11, 2011 6:14 AM
> To:
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
>
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] evaluating accessibility with WCAG 2.0 (Angela French)
>
> Thanks for rekindling the discussion, John. Agreed: it is an interesting
> topic.
>
> Success Criterion 1.3.1 does not seem to offer an absolute conclusion
> either way with regard to a group of links displayed horizontally and
> separated by
> the pipe character, even if we all seem to be in agreement that best
> practice would have it marked up as an unordered list. I meant to
> suggest in my earlier
> comments that, should one want to take a strict approach in terms of
> enforcing best practice and semantic HTML, that it could be considered
> a WCAG violation.
> In the end, however, the application of the Success Criterion, at
> least in this scenario, is certainly open to interpretation.
>
> This is what I find most interesting about the discussion. While WCAG
> 2.0 has done much to provide more strongly testable guidelines,
> thereby resulting in more decisive declarations of what does or does
> not comply, there
> still remains room for argument and interpretation, particularly with
> certain Success Criteria like 1.3.1. I'm not suggesting this is
> necessarily a bad
> thing.
>
> For argument's sake, let's assume that the main navigation is a group
> of links visually presented in typical fashion as a distinct and
> horizontally arranged
> grouping, with each link separated by a pipe. Is it reasonable to
> suggest that this arrangement visually *implies* that the structure of
> the overall grouping
> and the relationships among the links are those of a list? Certainly,
> such a visual arrangement is not the traditional presentation of a
> vertical list
> of bulleted list items, but does a sighted user conceptually
> understand this arrangement as a set or list of individual but related
> links? What are the
> reasons for displaying them as a distinct group and of separating each
> link with a pipe?
>
> John correctly notes that a list of links so presented and marked up
> is hardly an egregious accessibility barrier. Still, declaring such
> less than ideal
> markup as a violation of WCAG, especially when more usable and
> semantically correct markup exists, can be a nice bit of leverage in
> certain contexts, at
> least in terms of requiring best practices and accessible, semantic HTML.
>
> Is such an interpretation even reasonable, or am I just muddying the
> waters around the intent of Success Criterion 1.3.1 or of the
> application of WCAG
> Success Criteria in general?
>
> Jason
>
> On 11/04/11 20:26, John Hicks wrote:
> block quote
> Hello
> I see from this exchange that my previous remark was perhaps too
> severe and I buy the arguments given since.
> Of course many screen readers do link listings also so the fact that
> these links are not in an html list is not the end of the story
> Nevertheless, using an ascii character (the pipe symbol) for
> formatting still irks me.
> If this "non-list" of links were vertical with a lower case "o" making
> a bullet for each item .... which is basically the same thing, I bet
> the reactions would be different.
> In any event it would read like a romantic poem (O! site map, O!
> Contact, O! Terms of Use...)
> Interesting topic
> best wishes,
> John
> e 09/04/2011 01:29, Angela French a écrit :
> block quote
> Agreed.
> -----Original Message-----
> From:
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
> [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
> On Behalf Of Keith
> (mteye)
> Sent: Friday, April 08, 2011 4:27 PM
> To: WebAIM Discussion List
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] evaluating accessibility with WCAG 2.0 (Angela
> French)
> It may be that a self trained html coder isn't aware of the method to
> create horizontal lists, rather than a vertical list (default behavior
> for browsers.)
> There's no excuse for someone claiming to be a professional web designer.
> Just a personal observation, and opinion.
> from
> Keith H
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Karen Sorensen
> Sent: Friday, April 08, 2011 1:29 PM
> To:
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] evaluating accessibility with WCAG 2.0 (Angela
> French)
> Good reminder John Hicks. The separation of content from
> design/layout/format with CSS is critical. If the pipes are used to
> separate a list, but the
> list isn't HTML coded as a list, that would be interpreted incorrectly
> by a screen reader.
> Karen Sorensen
> PCC Instructional Technology Specialist Coordinating ADA Compliance
> of Instructional Media
> 971-722-4720
>