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Alt-text vs. Aria

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From: Maupin, Brennan Polaris McCaffrey - maupinbp
Date: Apr 2, 2019 8:14AM

Hi all!
I have been looking at a website and have some questions regarding the use of alt-text vs aria, as well as aria's relevance in HTML5.

1) I have heard in the past that with HTML5, it is best to use HTML5 over ARIA whenever possible, and only use ARIA when necessary. It was mentioned that when used in incorrectly, ARIA can "break" a page more than fix it. Do you all have opinions on this? I have not been combing through html long enough to ever see ARIA "break" a page's functionality.

2) I am noticing that on the page I'm looking at, the developers have added wonderful alternative text to describe page elements that serve particular functions, but the elements themselves are not tagged in the way that I would (with aria attributes.)

For example, there is a navigation menu consisting of list of drop-down links and sub-links. The top level links have excellent alt-text attached to them explaining that they contain sub-links and how to operate them.

If I were designing the site, I would be inclined to use the "has-submenu" class and attributes to work better with a screen reader and in an effort to conform with 4.1.2 - Name, Role, Value.

My question is, is the alt-text method *incorrect*? It seems to essentially serve the same purpose, but I also feel like it does not conform to 4.1.2. Any thoughts on this?

-Brennan Maupin