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Re: Usability of ARIA combobox

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From: Mallory
Date: Nov 27, 2018 11:42PM

Gerard Cohen ran into probably everything with comboboxes (though his don't have a text field so are not technically complete comboboxes): https://technica11y.org/making-custom-selects-accessible

You might find some interesting bits in this video (or read the transcript after the video).

cheers,
Mallory

On Tue, Nov 27, 2018, at 9:34 PM, Catt, James wrote:
> Hi all, I'm looking for some input/opinions from regular screen reader
> users on the usability of ARIA combobox patterns.
>
> When following the ARIA combobox authoring practices
> (https://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria-practices-1.1/#combobox), it seems as
> though the information read out by JAWS & NVDA when focusing the text
> input isn't that helpful. NVDA announces that it's a combobox, but
> doesn't provide any further info. JAWS adds that the arrow keys can be
> used to navigate the list, and may announce the expanded state of the
> listbox depending on the implementation. Generally speaking, though, by
> default there doesn't seem to be much info read out to inform the user
> that there's a list of suggestions available-it seems like they would
> have to be familiar with the design pattern and just guess that it's
> there.
>
> A better implementation seems to the be one used on expedia.ca - they
> use a live region to announce the number of results and tell the user
> that they can use the arrow keys to navigate.
>
> To regular SR users: do you encounter/use comboboxes often in the wild?
> Do you find they're useful and/or intuitive?
>
> Thanks in advance!
>
> James Catt
> Inclusive Design Consultant, OLB | CIBC Digital
>
> > > >