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Re: Proper Way to Render Table for Reading Cells

for

From: Moore,Michael (HHSC)
Date: Jul 6, 2015 10:39AM

A couple of quick tests to make sure that JAWS is really behaving the way that you think it is.

If it is not reading the form field labels - make sure that you are in forms mode. JAWS 11 was pretty finicky about switching modes automatically. Also when in the field use JAWSKey+up arrow to read the line again - this is the say current line command.

For the table make sure that you are navigating using the table reading commands. Cntrl+alt+arrows should provide enough for your purposes. Also make sure that you are out of Forms mode. Go into settings and turn on enter forms mode manually so that you can toggle reliably.

If you are relying on WAI-ARIA support keep in mind that both Freedom Scientific and IE have done a lot to add support since IE8 and JAWS 11 so you may find that there are WAI-ARIA features that are not supported.

Mike Moore
Accessibility Coordinator
Texas Health and Human Services Commission
Civil Rights Office
(512) 438-3431 (Office)
(512) 574-0091 (Cell)


-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ] On Behalf Of Christopher Koeber
Sent: Monday, July 06, 2015 11:22 AM
To: WebAIM Discussion List
Subject: [WebAIM] Proper Way to Render Table for Reading Cells

Hello,

So this may be a long post, hope folks can hear me out.

As I mentioned in prior posts, I am developing a webpage for IE8 and JAWS 11. I need to not only have all elements of the webpage read but the application completely usable; any disabled user can perform the functionality as a sighted/non-disabled user can.

What I have is the HTML output below. So far, in IE 8 / Jaws 11 I can get most of everything read from the output below BUT I have the following
problems:

- Table Cell values are not being read at all. All I get is something
like "Row 5 Cell 1". As you will see below, I have additional content that
I want only the screen reader (JAWS) to read and not shown. So I have
content wrapped inside a DIV with a class that I want only the JAWS reader
to pick up. Within JAWS 11 and IE 8 how can I get the content in the cells
to be read? In the output below you will note that I have the content that
I want the JAWS reader to read which describes exactly what the cell
contains.
- Related to the table, for non-disabled users folks can select the row
using a mouse and then easily click on a set of functions related to the
row (EDIT, EXPORT, DELETE, etc.) What I want is an easy way for disabled
folks to be able to have this functionality. Ideally I want to have a
hotkey of some kind so that people can just press a key on their keyboard
and a function within JavaScript fires off that executes the said function.
Via another forum I found that screen-readers take over most of the
shortcuts, however. What is the best alternative I can offer disabled folks
while keeping the functionality for sighted folks the same?
- The labels are not being read for the Text fields. All I here when I
tab to a text field is "Type in Text".

Thank you for all of your time, I have linked the HTML output below; if needed I can post additional content, etc. if needed.

Note; this isn't all of the output, just the HTML output as this is an internal application. Content sanitized.
Regards,

Christopher Koeber

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Link to Text File containing HTML Output ​---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------​

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