WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: aria-controls

for

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Jul 7, 2020 1:17PM


At minimum, a shortcut key to jump from the control to the content,
and from the content back to the control.
Yes, announcement of changes would be nice (similar to what Jaws for
mouseover events) but an accurate summary of the changes is very hard
to predict.
The thing that aria-controls does not provide is identifying the
content that was displayed.
My input into the tab ARIA spec, (minor though it was) was to use
aria-labelledby on the tabpanel rather than aria-controls on the tab
control (or at least require both).
If the element that was disaplyed has a grouping or landmark element
and an accessible name, a screen reader is able to indicate to users
where that content starts and where it ends.
This is harder to do, though not impossible with aria-controls (screen
readers would have to assign an automatic landmark region).

Similar attributes include aria-owns, aria-details, aria-flowto and,
to some degree, aria-describedby.



On 7/7/20, Miriam Fukushima < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> I think a jump shortcut to the controlled content and maybe having a
> label of some sort read out is what I'd expect.
>
> But as I have seen this kind of more-content-control in different
> contexts, where sometimes more plain text, sometimes listitems, more
> fields of a filter widget and sometimes more whole articles are added, I
> think it is too complicated to specify what was added.
>
>
> Regards Miriam.
>
> On 07.07.2020 14:46, Jonathan Cohn wrote:
>> Of more interest to me, is what would one want if aria-controls had screen
>> reader functionality? Should it give a summary of the changes
>> 5 items added to controlled list
>> Controlled item no longer exists
>> Perhaps some marker in Braille letting one jump to a controlled item much
>> like the "j" in JAWS jumps one to a specific element number and shift J
>> then jumps you back?
>>
>> What other ARIA markup that uses ids for the value might be worth
>> providing additional controls, and should they be different than what
>> aria-controls would be provided if they did exist?
>> Jonathan
>> Jonathan Cohn
>>
>>
>>
>>> On Jul 7, 2020, at 2:48 AM, Miriam Fukushima < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> Thank you so much for both suggestions!
>>>
>>> I guess I'll experiment a bit, just in case and if it comes up, to advice
>>> to put new content after the control.
>>>
>>>
>>> Have a good day, everyone!
>>>
>>> Miriam
>>>
>>> On 06.07.2020 12:31, Birkir R. Gunnarsson wrote:
>>>> It's a tricky situation. aria-controls does not rearrange content
>>>> order for a screen reader. It merely indicates the relationship
>>>> between the button and the content affected by the button (and it has
>>>> very limited screen reader support, I think only Jaws exposes it).
>>>> I think master Hayden wrote the "aria-controls is poop" article, too
>>>> lazy to Google the URL but it's both amusing and he's basically
>>>> correct.
>>>> Best to change the content order, it's going to be a bit of a fight
>>>> with the designersw I suppose.
>>>> If not possible, there is another sort of hack.
>>>>
>>>> You can use aria-owns to rearrange the content, provided you have an
>>>> element that owns both the content and the button and that both have
>>>> unique id attributes.
>>>>
>>>> <div aria-owns="b1 c1">
>>>>
>>>> <div id="c1">I am the content displayed when you press a button</div>
>>>>
>>>> <button id="b1">I am the button</button>
>>>> </div>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Jaws shows the button before the content in Chrome, I'm also too lazy
>>>> to check other combinations (just got up), but in previous aria-owns
>>>> testing this appears to work in Chrome and, I think, Firefox but no
>>>> idea about the rest, it won't have universal support.
>>>> #NeedCoffee
>>>>
>>>> On 7/6/20, Miriam Fukushima < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>>>>> Hello everyone,
>>>>>
>>>>> I just read about aria-controls and that JAWS doesn't announce it.
>>>>>
>>>>> I recently saw a button to reveal more content beneath a text.
>>>>> When you press it, it slides downwards and reveals more content above
>>>>> itself.
>>>>> It has aria-expanded and aria-controls.
>>>>>
>>>>> How would be the recommendation for that kind of control to
>>>>> communicate
>>>>> where to find the expanded content?
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Thank you very much for the input!
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Regards,
>>>>>
>>>>> Miriam
>>>>>
>>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>>
>>> >>> >>> >>> >> >> >> >> > > > > >


--
Work hard. Have fun. Make history.