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Required Fields and Username / Password on a Website

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From: Elle
Date: Jul 23, 2012 5:02PM

All:

We're redesigning our website, and there's discussion about whether any
indication of required fields is necessary for "username" and password" to
sign into the member portal. All the Section 508 and WCAG 2.0
documentation I see seems to state that it's a violation if you don't
indicate "this field is required" by either an asterisk, an image, text
(ex. "required"), or grouping like fields together by validation. However,
the WCAG content seems more for multiple form fields. On the
Section508.gov website, the Search text input field responds like a
required field (it has a validation / error prompt if you hit Submit
without entering text), but there is no indication that Search is a
required field to successfully Submit. My UX team is telling me that
Username and Password are obviously required if you want to sign in on a
website, and that even an asterisk is unnecessary. So, my questions are:


1. Is it necessary (to meet conformance requirements) to have an
asterisk next to Username and Password for a sign-in widget on a website?
2. If the guidance text ** Required* exists near the top of the page,
can we remove it from a similar sign-in widget on the left rail?


Thanks very much,
Elle