WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Glossary Links

for

From: David Ashleydale
Date: Mar 26, 2012 3:20PM

Have any of you seen good, accessible examples of glossary term
functionality on web pages? What I have in mind is the type of
functionality where there are complex vocabulary words on a web page and
the user can interact with the words to find their definitions or other
helpful information.

Example: A user is reading a web page about mathematics. Sprinkled
throughout the article are vocabulary words that a non-mathematician might
not understand. There is a sentence that says, "If a PDE has coefficients
that are not constant, it is possible that it will not belong to any of
these categories but rather be of mixed type." Some of these words and
phrases, like "PDE" and "mixed type" are links. When a user clicks on the
"PDE" link, a new layer appears on top of the web page with a one sentence
definition of what a PDE is. This layer has a "Close" link in it that makes
the layer go away. Users can also just hover over the link using a mouse to
make the layer appear -- it disappears when they move the cursor away from
the link.

There are obviously many accessibility concerns with this type of
functionality. Have any of you come across a really great, accessible
example of this? Does ARIA help with it?

Thanks!
David Ashleydale