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Re: Name, Role, Value and Labels or Instructions techniques...

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From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: Mar 31, 2015 7:31AM

On 31/03/2015 14:18, Moore,Michael (DARS) wrote:
> I am not sure that using a title when a visible label is present
> (Technique H65) actually meets all of the requirements for labeling
> non text content (form controls). (4.1.2, 3.3.2, and 1.1.1)

Why?

> It
> certainly has the potential to cause confusion if the title and the
> label do not match.

Of course, anything that's done wrong can cause confusion.

> Technique H65 description: "The objective of this technique is to use
> the title attribute to label form controls when the visual design
> cannot accommodate the label (for example, if there is no text on the
> screen that can be identified as a label) or where it might be
> confusing to display a label. User agents, including assistive
> technology, can speak the title attribute."
>
> Since a visible label is present and is clear using the title instead
> of the label does not fulfil the use case for the technique.

Keep in mind that techniques are informative (and some of them aren't
particularly good/well worded), while only the SCs in WCAG 2.0 are
normative.

> Additionally marking up the label using something other than the
> label element may potentially violate 4.1.1 Using the markup language
> to spec. (Technique G192).

4.1.1 itself is only concerned with "elements have complete start and
end tags, elements are nested according to their specifications,
elements do not contain duplicate attributes, and any IDs are unique".

G192 goes further and demands full validation. But...you can't violate a
technique, as techniques are only informative. So full validation is not
required to pass WCAG 2.0. Also, HTML does not *mandate* that <label>
must be used, so arguably even not using <label> does not contravene the
HTML spec.

As we're looking around for other WCAG 2.0 SCs that may stick, 1.3.1
Info and Relationships may be a good one...you *could* argue that not
using <label> and having those labels correctly associated with their
form controls violates 1.3.1 - though, if the controls were to use
@title (or @aria-label, or even @placeholder), correctly - albeit
redundantly - to convey the exact same text, you could also argue that
the end result is the same.

P
--
Patrick H. Lauke

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