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From: Sonja Weckenmann
Date: Sat, Apr 02 2022 11:24AM
Subject: expectations role=group / role=region
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Hi,

I am aware of the semantic difference between role="region" and
role="group".

Assuming the roles are both used with an accessible name:
In terms of role="group" assistive technology should convey the
boundaries of the group (in reading mode).

What about role="region"?
I wonder if I can claim the same expectation for role="region" (in
reading mode)? Or is the use of role="region" not meant to meet such
expectations?

Thanks a lot
Sonja



--
Sonja Weckenmann
IAAP Web Accessibility Specialist (WAS)

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Sun, Apr 03 2022 5:38AM
Subject: Re: expectations role=group / role=region
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You should, all landmark role should communicate the region boundries
(as well as role="group"), this is why landmark roles are occasionally
a better choice than headings that only mark the start of a section of
content, (especially if the following section of content does not
start with a heading).
I'm finding that screen reader announcements for the region role are
disappearing, especially in Jaws, even if the region has an accessible
name.
I have to say I find this concerning.


On 4/2/22, Sonja Weckenmann < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I am aware of the semantic difference between role="region" and
> role="group".
>
> Assuming the roles are both used with an accessible name:
> In terms of role="group" assistive technology should convey the
> boundaries of the group (in reading mode).
>
> What about role="region"?
> I wonder if I can claim the same expectation for role="region" (in
> reading mode)? Or is the use of role="region" not meant to meet such
> expectations?
>
> Thanks a lot
> Sonja
>
>
>
> --
> Sonja Weckenmann
> IAAP Web Accessibility Specialist (WAS)
>
>
> > > > >


--
Work hard. Have fun. Make history.

From: Bryan Garaventa
Date: Mon, Apr 04 2022 11:16AM
Subject: Re: expectations role=group / role=region
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" I'm finding that screen reader announcements for the region role are disappearing, especially in Jaws, even if the region has an accessible name."

I forget when this was introduced in JAWS, but I filed a bug against this a long time ago. Basically, named regions are not reliably announced unless "Virtual Cursor Verbosity" is set to "High", which is "Medium" by default. Personally I find this extremely annoying.

You can see this by visiting:
https://whatsock.com/Templates/Accordions/Internal/index.htm

On the page in FF or Chrome with JAWS running:
1. Press Insert+V to open the Verbosity dialog.
2. On the option "Virtual Cursor Verbosity", press Spacebar to toggle this to "High" and press Enter.

Now you will hear named regions.

I still think this is a major issue for accessible intuitive navigation that you have to enable accessibility because it is not provided by default.



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

From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Mon, Apr 04 2022 11:23AM
Subject: Re: expectations role=group / role=region
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I couldn't agree more!
I also find it weird that navigation landmarks are exposed with
default settings but regions are not. I'm fine with regions without an
accessible name not being exposed (after all a region without an
accessible name is technically speaking not a landmark), but a legit
region with an accessible name is there for a reason, to describe a
section of content and communicate its boundaries. Without screen
reader support this important info does not get communicated.
It's no wonder that screen reader user reliance on ARIA landmarks is
dwindling (see the WebAIM screen reader user surveys).
As for the question, use the group role if it achieves the intended
purpose, to communicate carousel name and boundaries to a screen
reader user. I'm all for theoretical clarity but if assistive
technologies do not support the ideal approach we have to find a
practical approach that works.


On 4/4/22, Bryan Garaventa via WebAIM-Forum
< = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> " I'm finding that screen reader announcements for the region role are
> disappearing, especially in Jaws, even if the region has an accessible
> name."
>
> I forget when this was introduced in JAWS, but I filed a bug against this a
> long time ago. Basically, named regions are not reliably announced unless
> "Virtual Cursor Verbosity" is set to "High", which is "Medium" by default.
> Personally I find this extremely annoying.
>
> You can see this by visiting:
> https://whatsock.com/Templates/Accordions/Internal/index.htm
>
> On the page in FF or Chrome with JAWS running:
> 1. Press Insert+V to open the Verbosity dialog.
> 2. On the option "Virtual Cursor Verbosity", press Spacebar to toggle this
> to "High" and press Enter.
>
> Now you will hear named regions.
>
> I still think this is a major issue for accessible intuitive navigation that
> you have to enable accessibility because it is not provided by default.
>
>
>
> Bryan Garaventa
> Principal Accessibility Architect
> Level Access, Inc.
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> 415.624.2709 (o)
> www.LevelAccess.com
>
>

From: glen walker
Date: Mon, Apr 04 2022 12:16PM
Subject: Re: expectations role=group / role=region
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All good info so far. Another option, instead of changing the JAWS
verbosity level to high is to adjust the medium (default) verbosity level
to include named regions.

Bring up the settings center and expand the "Web / HTML / PDFs" branch (the
2nd one in the tree), and then the "Reading" sub-branch (frst one), and
then "Configure Web Verbosity Levels", and then "Medium".

The "Announce Start and End For" list has regions (generically, meaning
landmarks), near the bottom with various landmark types. Region is one of
the types and is unchecked by default for medium verbosity. It's checked
for high verbosity. So you could turn it on for medium if you wanted to.

For sighted JAWS users, here are two screenshots as described above. The
first is the setting center with "medium" verbosity selected. The second
is the list of verbosity elements that can be announced, with Region
highlighted near the bottom.

From: Bryan Garaventa
Date: Mon, Apr 04 2022 1:07PM
Subject: Re: expectations role=group / role=region
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That's true.

The biggest problem, as I see it, is that the majority of screen reader users will never do this because they assume that the greatest level of accessibility is enabled by default, which in this case it is not.

In the case of named regions, there are many things you can use these for that go beyond what the ARIA spec documents, all of which add rich accessibility support for these widget types. That is, if users are ever aware of these because most will not be now.

Besides accordions, here are several others which you can test with named regions enabled to see what I mean.

Carousels: https://whatsock.com/Templates/Carousels/AutoRotate/index.htm
Popups: https://whatsock.com/Templates/Popups/Internal/index.htm
Tooltips: https://whatsock.com/Templates/Tooltips/Internal/index.htm

All of these widget types benefit from detailed region boundary information, which are explicitly provided as named regions. Otherwise there is no way to identify where the widget or dynamic content regions begin and end.

It is no wonder why landmark regions are declining in the WebAim survey if standard users are never even made aware that these sections even exist during standard navigation.

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