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Screenreader Forms Mode as Only Interaction Method?

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From: Dan Holbrook
Date: Mar 2, 2017 11:36AM

This was touched upon in the previous thread "Forms, forms mode and static
text interaction with Jaws" but forms mode requires extra care to be taken
in order to make sure certain information (e.g. disabled fields with data,
field instructions, legal disclaimers) is read.

In our testing of forms right now (NVDA and JAWS) we browse to the form,
enter data in the first field, then tab through the form, which requires
developers to attempt to make forms fully accessible to users who use
tabbing alone for form navigation.

I have talked to a few people who use browse mode to go through the form
and used forms mode only for entry, which would make this extra work
unnecessary. I'd like to see if there is a consensus or trend around how
screen reader users navigate forms: do you tab through fields once in a
form (remaining in forms mode) or do you navigate forms with a combination
of forms mode and browsing?

*Dan Holbrook**QA Engineer and Co-President
<http://www.nerdery.com/copresident>;**The
Nerdery**http://www.nerdery.com/people#hz <http://www.nerdery.com/Xx>;*