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Re: Link vs Button for "Cancel"

for

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Jan 12, 2018 5:04AM

That touches on a different subject that has been discussed on Twitter.
There is no ARIA )or an equivalent easy to use standard way) to
indicate primary calls to action for a screen reader.
IN fact, using role="button" can be the closest we get to it (since
CTAs often visually look a bit like buttons).
I think the fact that something is highlighted as the primary action
on a webpage is visual information that needs to be communicated.
I am hoping we can get something like aria-primary into the ARIA 2.0 standard.
Alternatively, we could add a toen value to aria-current something
like aria-current="action".

ON the link vs. button argument, where would you fall on back and
continue (or right/left arrow actions) in a multi-page form?
YOu could say these are links because they take you to another page,
and they do not cause information to be submitted.
ON the other hand, they do update information in a database (at least
temporarily, and at least the next/continue control does).
Also they need to be easily distinguisable for a screen reader and
users expect these controls to be buttons, from operating system
experience.

Point is, this is not always cut and dry, and I still think we read
way more into this than a user does.
I started on the functional aspsect of the spectuum myself, but by now
I believe the assistive technology experience should reflect the
visual appearance.
After all, if it performs the action of a link, all users, not just
screen reader users, should perceive it as a link. So try to get the
developers to change the stling to match the functionality as a first
step.
If they refuse, deceive all users equally.



On 1/12/18, Patrick H. Lauke < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> On 08/01/2018 21:51, Beranek, Nicholas via WebAIM-Forum wrote:
>> I'm reminded of an article from Marcy Sutton about this very topic:
>>
>> https://marcysutton.com/links-vs-buttons-in-modern-web-applications/
>>
>> I know the argument, "if it looks like a button, then it should be a
>> button."
>
> It's not always as cut-and-dried as that, though. It's quite common to
> have things like "call to action" links styled to look button-like, and
> to me that's a perfectly valid case for still using a link, while also
> visually highlighting the link for prominence.
>
> What counts is the intent/action, not the appearance (unless the
> appearance strongly suggests an intent/action in and of itself).
>
> P
> --
> Patrick H. Lauke
>
> www.splintered.co.uk | https://github.com/patrickhlauke
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> > > > >


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