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Time-out modal with alertdialog

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From: Sean Keegan
Date: Jul 3, 2015 1:56AM

I am working on a time-out modal that is triggered after 10 minutes of no
activity within an application. There is an empty parent <div> into which
the time out modal is loaded when the time limit is triggered. This modal
is comprised of a descendent <div> with role=alertdialog and tabindex=0.

During testing, I noticed JAWS and NVDA will announce the modal window if
focus is on an input field, the user is typing, or if there is no activity
by the user when the time period elapses. However, if navigating the page
using the virtual buffer commands (such as a Say All), there is no
notification to the user by the screen-reader that the modal has been
triggered.

A colleague and I are debating the role=alertdialog and if there may need
to be a more assertive notification when the time out modal is triggered.
Would adding aria-live=assertive to a <div> that already contains
role=alertdialog be redundant or should the aria-live property be applied
to the parent <div> so that it can monitor all descendents?

Take care,
Sean