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Re: Should disabled elements receive tab focus

for

From: Jonathan Cohn
Date: Oct 28, 2016 8:42AM

So in the situation where there are two combo-boxes and a submit button on
a page, and the second combo box has no choices until the first combo box
has a selection made would you want that second combo to be in the tab
order? We were talking about adding a aria-disabled to the second combo box
until there are choices in the it, would make more sense to mark it
completely disabled?

On 28 October 2016 at 10:24, Jonathan Avila < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
wrote:

> > How does keeping non-actionable controls out of the tab order present a
> more accurate description of the interface in its present state?
>
> There are a few instances where it could be useful. For example, if I
> have 5 checkboxes but one of the 5 checkbox is disabled until I change
> something in the form and I am a screen reader user who happens to be using
> tab to navigate through the form I could wind up in a situation where I
> wasn't aware of the 5th checkboxes existence. Yes, screen reader users
> could go looking for it and yes generally non-interactive items shouldn't
> be in the tab order -- but asking a person to review the form in browse
> mode when tab otherwise might be used could trip up some people. I'm not
> advocating for putting a lot of things in the focus order -- I agree it's
> an issue -- but there are some situations where it could be helpful.
>
> A similar problem is with the exception of disabled controls not needing
> to meet contrast requirements. I understand the desire to make the control
> look disabled by changing the contrast. However, some disabled controls
> are not readable to people with low vision do to contrast. So the low
> vision user is forced to try and figure out what in the form is needed to
> make that disabled control enabled so they can read it only to find out it
> wasn't something they wanted anyway. If the control is on-screen it should
> be readable with a minimum level of contrast by all users so they can make
> the determination of what to do or not do in the form.
>
> Jonathan
>
>
> Jonathan Avila
> Chief Accessibility Officer
> SSB BART Group
> <EMAIL REMOVED>
> 703.637.8957 (Office)
>
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