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Re: Support for link Title tag?

for

From: Andrew Kirkpatrick
Date: Nov 1, 2004 1:14PM

> AFAIK, Title attributes are only read by screen readers if the end-user
> explicitely turns this option on.

This is true for the most common screen readers, most of the time. For
JAWS, W-E, and HPR, the title is available but not automatically - just like
you said. For ZoomText with speech the title is read preferentially.

If you make the anchor have a CSS generated background, but no content, then
the title is read by JAWS (4.0 to 5.1), Window-Eyes 4.5, HPR 3.0x, and
ZoomText (8.1+). Of course, then you have no content in the link itself
which would be a problem for users without CSS-browsers.

This would also be a problem for Mozilla (and Safari) users since Mozilla
doesn't display the background image to an empty link, rendering the whole
effort a waste. IE does display the image (or just a background color with
height and width defined). Both browsers will allow keyboard users to
access the link, although the focus is only visible for IE users since
Mozilla and Safari don't display a link.

This message solves nothing, but just in case anyone is interested in when
the title attribute is read...

AWK

--
Andrew Kirkpatrick
Project Manager, WGBH National Center for Accessible Media
125 Western Ave.
Boston, MA 02134

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