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Re: Footnotes

for

From: chagnon@pubcom.com
Date: Aug 22, 2018 11:38AM

I think this is a very narrow view of what a footnotes does...and how it
should perform.

No matter what form of publishing we use -- web, digital, print -- there is
a need for accessory, explanatory detailed information about something.

I don't care what name we gives these pieces of information -- footnote,
endnote, reference, whatever -- the need is there.

Yes, footnotes were originally developed for printed books, but that doesn't
mean the concept is now outdated. Instead, we need to develop methods and
techniques that provide this information to the majority of people across
all technologies.

--Bevi

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Bevi Chagnon, founder/CEO | <EMAIL REMOVED>
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PubCom: Technologists for Accessible Design + Publishing
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Upcoming classes at www.PubCom.com/classes
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-----Original Message-----
From: WebAIM-Forum < <EMAIL REMOVED> > On Behalf Of Guy
Hickling
Sent: Wednesday, August 22, 2018 1:13 PM
To: <EMAIL REMOVED>
Subject: Re: [WebAIM] Footnotes

The best way to do accessible footnotes is not to have them! They are a
carry over from paper books, and in my view are something best left in books
and not carried over to the internet.

Paper books are for sighted people, and if there are footnotes at the bottom
of the page the sighted reader only has to take a quick glance down to read
them. But the internet is for everyone, and footnotes, even when done as
accessibly as possible, are not very manageable. Even sighted, non-disabled
people must scroll down, maybe more than once, to see the footnotes, then
scroll back up again and try to find where they were.

For disabled peopled it is much worse; keyboard-only users have to follow
links to the footnotes (assuming the developer has created links which is
not usually the case). As you have found yourself, screen readers don't
always handle them well. People with poor eyesight have to zoom just to read
them (and the superscript numbers or characters often need even more zooming
to read them, especially when they immediately follow a word of text with no
intervening space). And many designers and developers show them in a light
grey colour as well thus ensuring maximum difficulty for all.

For an alternative solution, Brandon has just beaten me to the draw while I
was writing this, with his suggestion of modal popups instead, which I like.
Or for another alternative presentation, suppose you put the footnotes for
each question directly underneath the question they apply to (yes, even
though some might have to be repeated for more than one question). Perhaps
give them a different colour (but contrasting well against the page) and/or
font, to distinguish them from the question text, and use the same size font
so no one has to use zoom to read them.

Or lay out the page in two columns, with the exam question on the left side
of the page, and the footnotes applying to that question on the right
(probably narrower) side of the page? Either way, sighted users can see the
relevant footnotes without scrolling, and keyboard users, including screen
reader users, don't need to follow any links. They will immediately follow
the exam questions in the DOM, which helps screen readers users.

In your particular situation of exam questions, another solution might be:
do these footnotes need to be there? - perhaps some might be more
appropriate as instructions at the top of the list of questions? Just a
another thought. There are many ways to avoid footnotes.

If you cannot do any of the above, then there are procedures for making
footnotes accessible that have been described elsewhere in various places so
I won't go into them here. But the basic idea is to ensure that keyboard
users have a way to navigate to the footnote using a link, then to navigate
back again to where they were.

I hope I have been able to convince a few people to move away from
footnotes; I don't think they are very useful in websites!

Regards,
Guy Hickling
Accessibility
Auditor and
Consultant
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