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Re: accessible calendar controls

for

From: Bryan Garaventa
Date: Jan 26, 2022 11:16AM

Hi,
There really isn't, mainly because there is no way to predict when or how a disabled element may be relevant. There are definitely bad UI designs where disabled elements are improperly used to represent controls that would be better served with toggles and the like, but these conditions have to be taken on a case by case basis.

To clarify, the word unavailable on Windows comes from the state that is set on the element in the accessibility tree when disabled, and isn't meant to convey that you can do something specific to make it enabled, though some UIs may make it possible to change something to cause the element to become enabled automatically.

You can see an example of this at
https://www.whatsock.com/Templates/Tooltips/Help%20(Responsive)/index.htm
Where the Submit button is disabled until you type the right answer in the edit field.

In this case, the disabled attribute is used on a standard button element, but it sets the same state as though aria-disabled were being used. If the ARIA attribute were used here instead, it would actually be incorrect because doing so would not disable the button, it would just be conveyed as being disabled without preventing the wrong data from being submitted.

Regarding the radio button example, often this is used correctly in circumstances where some conditions are true sometimes but not always. For example, if a specific number of shipping options are provided by a company, but depending on the product, only some of these are actually available at checkout, then the radios that are not applicable will be disabled.

I'm not sure if this answers your question, but hopefully it helps a bit.

All the best,
Bryan



Bryan Garaventa
Principal Accessibility Architect
Level Access, Inc.
<EMAIL REMOVED>
415.624.2709 (o)
www.LevelAccess.com