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From: caron.darbyson
Date: Thu, Nov 19 2020 9:18AM
Subject: Data tables in html and blank cells
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Greetings!



I'm on a team moving courses to Canvas and something came up. We have some
assignment rubrics with blank cells. Headers for criteria and points are in
place. The folks working on coding believe that it is not a11y/508
compliant. They put placeholder text in each cell:

This area will be used by the assessor to leave comments related to this
criterion.

This would be read by a screenreader in every instance. Everything I find
indicates that leaving a cell blank is preferred and compliant.



I look forward to your expert advice.



Thanks!

Caron

From: Mark Magennis
Date: Fri, Nov 20 2020 2:37AM
Subject: Re: [EXTERNAL] Data tables in html and blank cells
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Caron,

There's no general accessibility problem with having blank cells in a table. It all comes down to what is clearest and easiest for users and that depends on the nature of the table and its data. In some cases blank cells may be confusing, for instance if there is a strong reason for the user to expect there to be content in cell. In that case a 'placeholder' message may be helpful. In your example, that doesn't sound like it would be the case. In fact, it sounds like the user might expect most of the cells to be blank.

I wouldn't worry too much about a placeholder message being repeated by a screen reader for every cell. In my experience working with screen reader users (I am not one myself) they will very quickly get used to hearing the placeholder message and will skip to the next cell as soon as they hear "This area". A minor annoyance at worst.

Mark

From: glen walker
Date: Fri, Nov 20 2020 9:54AM
Subject: Re: Data tables in html and blank cells
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As Mark said, there isn't an accessibility problem with blank cells as long
as there isn't some visual clue that the cell is blank other than it being
blank. For example, if you put an icon or something in the cell to make it
look blank then that indicator would have to be announced. But then I
suppose the cell isn't technically empty if it has an indicator.

Anyway, your situation might come down to user experience. Different
screen readers treat empty cells differently.

JAWS will say "blank" for the empty cell whether you navigate vertically
(down a column) or horizontally (across a row) to the cell.
NVDA will only say "blank" if you navigate vertically to the cell. It will
not say "blank" if you navigate across the row *and* the cell has a column
header. It will only say the column header. If there is no column header,
then NVDA will say "blank" if you navigate horizontally. I think that's an
NVDA bug.
VoiceOver on Mac will say "blank" for the empty cell whether you navigate
vertically or horizontally to the cell.
VoiceOver on iOS has the worst behavior. If I navigate across a row, it
will skip blank cells completely. It jumps right over it. If I have my
rotor set to navigate by rows and I swipe down to navigate down a column,
VO thinks you're at the bottom of the column if there's a blank cell below
it. You can't get to the other non-blank cells below the blank one.

On Thu, Nov 19, 2020 at 9:19 AM < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:

> Greetings!
>
>
>
> I'm on a team moving courses to Canvas and something came up. We have some
> assignment rubrics with blank cells. Headers for criteria and points are in
> place. The folks working on coding believe that it is not a11y/508
> compliant. They put placeholder text in each cell:
>
> This area will be used by the assessor to leave comments related to this
> criterion.
>
> This would be read by a screenreader in every instance. Everything I find
> indicates that leaving a cell blank is preferred and compliant.
>
>
>
> I look forward to your expert advice.
>
>
>
> Thanks!
>
> Caron
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> > > > >

From: Murphy, Sean
Date: Fri, Nov 20 2020 5:42PM
Subject: Re: Data tables in html and blank cells
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All,

On a side point. Does any one have examples where a screen reader does not navigate empty cell correctly. I am aware there is challenges when a table goes from 3 cells on one row, to 2 cells on the next. I am mor more interested in finding examples where tables with empty cells a screen reader cannot navigate pass that cell.


Regards
Sean Murphy

Sean Murphy | Senior Digital System specialist (Accessibility)
Telstra Digital Channels | Digital Systems
Mobile: 0405 129 739 | Desk: (02) 9866-7917
Digital Systems Launch Page
Accessibility Single source of Truth

From: glen walker
Date: Fri, Nov 20 2020 6:08PM
Subject: Re: Data tables in html and blank cells
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As I posted earlier, VoiceOver on iOS has trouble with empty cells. You
don't have to have a diff number of cells in the rows. I used a simple
example on w3schools and just modified the code to have a blank cell in the
middle.

https://www.w3schools.com/html/tryit.asp?filename=tryhtml_table_intro


On a side point. Does any one have examples where a screen reader does not
> navigate empty cell correctly. I am aware there is challenges when a table
> goes from 3 cells on one row, to 2 cells on the next. I am mor more
> interested in finding examples where tables with empty cells a screen
> reader cannot navigate pass that cell.
>
>