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Re: JAWS and disabled combobox options

for

From: Bryan Garaventa
Date: Jan 11, 2017 11:06PM

No problem, happy to help. :) One note for others, the bookmarklet was simply a personal utility I created to work around some accessibility issues I was encountering, but this should not ever be part of any development strategy for making something like this accessible.

To answer a prior question from JP Jamous, the scenario described has only one select element.

E.G Example syntax:

<select title="Choose a County" >
<option >Arizona</option>
<optgroup>
<option> County Name One </option>
<option> County Name Two </option>
</optgroup>
<option >California</option>
<optgroup>
<option> County Name One </option>
<option> County Name Two </option>
</optgroup>
</select>

You can quickly jump to California by typing "cal".

However if you try the following instead, this is impossible.


<select title="Choose a County" >
<option disabled >Arizona</option>
<optgroup>
<option> County Name One </option>
<option> County Name Two </option>
</optgroup>
<option disabled >California</option>
<optgroup>
<option> County Name One </option>
<option> County Name Two </option>
</optgroup>
</select>

This is why this practice should never be done.

Instead, client side scripting should be used to check the value of such options and prevent submission if the intended value is not selected.



Bryan Garaventa
Accessibility Fellow
SSB BART Group, Inc.
<EMAIL REMOVED>
415.624.2709 (o)
www.SSBBartGroup.com