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Thread: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
Number of posts in this thread: 16 (In chronological order)
From: Angela French
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 3:27PM
Subject: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Hello,
I am once again asking for any screen reader users to help me out with some AT testing. I think I mentioned elsewhere, that I have been asked to help fix the many accessibility issues on this site: http://sbctc.edu/index.aspx .
My question this time, is how screen reader users experience the set of rotating images that appears at the top of the News Releases on the home page. In the code it is presented as an <ul> with each picture (34 of them) presented as a <li> that appears one at a time (to the sighted user).
The first <li> in this list is a picture of "Edmonds", the second is "Wenatchee Valley", the third is "Bellevue".
My fear is that screen readers users have to listen to the whole darn list of images. As there is no "skip to main content" link provided on this site, I expect that you would bail pretty quickly.
I would be grateful to any of you who would take the time to test this out for me and let me know what you experienced and what AT you are using.
Thank you,
Angela French
Internet Specialist
State Board for Community and Technical Colleges
360-704-4316
= EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
http://www.checkoutacollege.com<;http://www.checkoutacollege.com/>;
From: Patrick Burke
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 3:33PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Hi Angela,
With Jaws 12 (build 1158) & Firefox 4, I do indeed get the whole
list. Some of the images seem to be repeated or split up, so there
are 60 or so items. For some reason they are not reported as a list.
Scrolling image banners are very popular with designers, & usually
very annoying for screen reader users. (Either because they refresh
the page every time they scroll, or just introduce new content when
you didn't expect it. So if I wanted to backtrack to reread
something, I would find that what I was looking for had disappeared,
without much clue as to why.) Fortunately you don't have those problems...
Overall I would say, consider what the purpose of the images is. In
this case, do they show that the Board serves some parts of the state
& not others? Or serves colleges at specific locations? In those
situations, an explicit list or statement to that effect would be more useful.
If it's a series of images meant to evoke the varied landscapes of
the state, then null alt text on the images might be best.
IN general, if anyone has an accessible solution for the scrolling
banner construct, I and the devs on my campus could definitely use it!
Thanks much,
Patrick
At 01:41 PM 5/18/2011, Angela French wrote:
>Hello,
>
>I am once again asking for any screen reader users to help me out
>with some AT testing. I think I mentioned elsewhere, that I have
>been asked to help fix the many accessibility issues on this
>site: http://sbctc.edu/index.aspx .
>
>My question this time, is how screen reader users experience the set
>of rotating images that appears at the top of the News Releases on
>the home page. In the code it is presented as an <ul> with each
>picture (34 of them) presented as a <li> that appears one at a time
>(to the sighted user).
>
>The first <li> in this list is a picture of "Edmonds", the second is
>"Wenatchee Valley", the third is "Bellevue".
>
>My fear is that screen readers users have to listen to the whole
>darn list of images. As there is no "skip to main content" link
>provided on this site, I expect that you would bail pretty quickly.
>
>I would be grateful to any of you who would take the time to test
>this out for me and let me know what you experienced and what AT you are using.
>
>Thank you,
>
>Angela French
--
Patrick J. Burke
Coordinator
UCLA Disabilities &
Computing Program
Phone: 310 206-6004
E-mail: burke <at> ucla. edu
Department Contact: = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
From: Angela French
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 3:39PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Thanks Patrick. They are just pretty pictures of each of our 34 campus locations.
From: Angela French
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:00PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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I would be embarrassed to say those links are something to create space in the nav bar. I know, I know....
What does keystroke "n" stand for? Is that something jaws-related?
From: Will Grignon
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:06PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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I use JAWS 12.
The graphics are read linearly in a very long list (approx.. 63 items.
Typing "n" skips all graphics and jumps the cursor to the first news item.
BTW - what are the two links labeled with "#" just above "Home" and just
below "Contact Us?"
I notice there are no headings, you might think about having a heading level
formatted title like News Releases, etc.
From: Angela French
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:12PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Patrick - If I keep the list, but use null value on the alt attribute, do you still perceive the list? Does it still waste your time and act as a nuisance?
From: Steve Green
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:18PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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In JAWS, the keystroke 'n' jumps to the next different type of element. It
is ideal for this scenario where you know there are a lot of elements of the
same type that you want to jump past but you don't know what the next
element type is after that.
Steve
From: Angela French
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:24PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Awesome! Thanks.
From: Patrick Burke
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:42PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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At 03:13 PM 5/18/2011, Angela French wrote:
>Patrick - If I keep the list, but use null value on the alt
>attribute, do you still perceive the list? Does it still waste your
>time and act as a nuisance?
I tried saving & editing offline. In that situation, using alt=""
makes the items "disappear", except for the bullets indicating that
list items exist.
However, as I mentioned before, the list markup doesn't come through
on the live version (I don't know why not), so the bullet markers
might not show up either.
Patrick
>
From: Angela French
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 4:48PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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It's run with Jquery. Perhaps that has something to do with it.
From: Tania
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 7:39PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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no problem. just use non linked text function to skip images.
suggest have a heading called 'main content' or something similar just below
rotating images links. or as you'd suggest about skip to main content.
normally i don't use skip to main content in a new site visit for first
time wantto know the structure first and whether there's anything useful
above main content.
cheers
tania
----- Original Message -----
From: "Angela French" < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
To: < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
Sent: Thursday, May 19, 2011 4:41 AM
Subject: [WebAIM] How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
> Hello,
>
> I am once again asking for any screen reader users to help me out with
> some AT testing. I think I mentioned elsewhere, that I have been asked to
> help fix the many accessibility issues on this site:
> http://sbctc.edu/index.aspx .
>
> My question this time, is how screen reader users experience the set of
> rotating images that appears at the top of the News Releases on the home
> page. In the code it is presented as an <ul> with each picture (34 of
> them) presented as a <li> that appears one at a time (to the sighted
> user).
>
> The first <li> in this list is a picture of "Edmonds", the second is
> "Wenatchee Valley", the third is "Bellevue".
>
> My fear is that screen readers users have to listen to the whole darn list
> of images. As there is no "skip to main content" link provided on this
> site, I expect that you would bail pretty quickly.
>
> I would be grateful to any of you who would take the time to test this out
> for me and let me know what you experienced and what AT you are using.
>
> Thank you,
>
> Angela French
> Internet Specialist
> State Board for Community and Technical Colleges
> 360-704-4316
> = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED =
> http://www.checkoutacollege.com<;http://www.checkoutacollege.com/>;
>
>
From: Will Grignon
Date: Wed, May 18 2011 11:03PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Typing "n" in JAWS Virtual PC cursor mode = takes cursor to next non link
text.
From: Angela French
Date: Thu, May 19 2011 10:00AM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Will - it would behoove me to leave in all the alt text for SEO reasons. Do you know if all AT devices have a means of skipping like the "n" in JAWS?
Would you say that JAWS users are well-versed in the use of the "n" key, or only advanced users?
From: Angela French
Date: Thu, May 19 2011 10:06AM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Tania, what do you mean by " just use non linked text function to skip images." ?
From: Will Grignon
Date: Thu, May 19 2011 2:39PM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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I'd imagine that most, if not all, AT have some navigation shortcut
keystrokes.
I can't speak for other JAWS users, but I suspect that most have devised
strategies for working through and around websites.
From: priti Rohra
Date: Sun, May 22 2011 9:39AM
Subject: Re: How do screen readers experience this image rotator?
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Hi Angela,
First of all JAWS 11 identifies it as a list of 62 items & it is
confusing. You can suggest:
Means to control the auto-updating images by adding Start/Stop buttons
Also add hidden instruction text for screen reader users about the
auto-updating nature of the images and what do they depict...
Instruction: Press "Stop" button to stop the auto-updating images and
access the image information...
FYI: I am using IE 8 & JAWS11.
Always BPositive!
Priti Rohra
On 5/20/11, Will Grignon < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> I'd imagine that most, if not all, AT have some navigation shortcut
> keystrokes.
>
> I can't speak for other JAWS users, but I suspect that most have devised
> strategies for working through and around websites.
>
>