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Re: Screenreader testing a JavaScript 'enhanced' page

for

From: Oliver Boermans
Date: Jun 28, 2006 4:10AM

Good point - it would certainly be better to have more specific
anchors to fall back on. The glossary anchors are legacy from our
attempt (5 years ago now!) to make it as simple as possible for the
client to mark-up the terms in the WYSIWYG of the content management
system. Call it laziness if you like. I imagine we could fix their
existing content with some clever search and replace...

The purpose behind the ugly anchors (with spans etc) is a workaround
for bugs in IE and Firefox. If there is a cleaner way around these
problems I'd love to hear about it:

- IE has problems when you navigate page anchors with the keyboard in
certain circumstances:
See links on this page
<http://wiki.jalakai.co.uk/css-demos/ie-keyboard-navigation>;

- I read somewhere (I've lost the link) that Firefox only jumps
reliably to <a> elements from an anchor. Worth retesting this one I
guess.

Further reading has enlightened me a little more about how JAWS works:
<http://juicystudio.com/article/making-ajax-work-with-screen-readers.php>;

Switching off the Virtual PC Cursor [insert z] causes JAWS to behave
more like I expected (reading titles etc), but it's functionality
appears to be significantly diminished. I take it forms mode is the
only way of triggering this kind of behaviour without asking the user
to switch manually?

I'm beginning to think that maybe it doesn't matter if the titles are
not read with this particular example. Perhaps linking the word is
sufficient context in itself?

What concerns me is what happens (with JavaScript enabled) when a
non-sighted user follows a linked term. Right now that seems to depend
on what mode the screenreader is in.

On 6/28/06, ben morrison < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> On 6/28/06, Oliver Boermans < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
> > Hi All
> >
> > Firstly - because a demo is worth a thousand words (Click on an orange link):
> > <http://www.ollicle.com/eg/inline-glossary/>;
> >
> > The purpose of the JavaScript in this page is to make finding the
> > definition of certain words less disruptive to reading. Clicking on a
> > term (orange link) pops up a description directly underneath the word.
> > Without the script these links point to glossary at the bottom of the
> > page.
>
> Instead of pointing to the glossary these links should point to the
> actual description of the term
>
> So : <a href="#glossary">eligible</a>
>
> should instead of pointing to the glossary point to this
>
> <dt><span><a id="eligible"></a></span>eligible</dt>
>
> but would be better coded as
>
> <a href="#eligible">eligible</a>
>
> <dt id="eligible">eligible</dt>
>
> Jaws does not read the title attribute by default - unless in forms mode.
>
> Ben