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Thread: Title Attribute Issue
Number of posts in this thread: 8 (In chronological order)
From: Jim Homme
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 8:58AM
Subject: Title Attribute Issue
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Hi,
I'm encountering a situation in which I see buttons NVDA reads the Title attribute for when I tab to them, but not when I arrow to them. The site uses the title attribute to explain more information when focus or hover is on the buttons. I feel that NVDA should read the Title attributes, since it drags focus to the buttons when the user arrows. I've read all sorts of negative stuff about using the Title attribute, but I feel that if this is an NvDA issue, I should not fail these buttons for having a Title attribute. They fail for not having descriptive names, but that is a different thing. Am I thinking correctly here?
Thanks.
Jim
==========
Jim Homme
Digital Accessibility
Bender Consulting Services
412-787-8567
https://www.benderconsult.com/our%20services/hightest-accessible-technology-solutions
From: Brian Lovely
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 9:06AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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Support for the title element is spotty, so I do not recommend relying on
it. Better to use aria-describedby set to the ID of an element containing
the desired text. You don't have to call out the button for use of the
title element, but you can for missing instructions.
On Fri, Aug 30, 2019 at 10:58 AM Jim Homme < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> Hi,
> I'm encountering a situation in which I see buttons NVDA reads the Title
> attribute for when I tab to them, but not when I arrow to them. The site
> uses the title attribute to explain more information when focus or hover is
> on the buttons. I feel that NVDA should read the Title attributes, since it
> drags focus to the buttons when the user arrows. I've read all sorts of
> negative stuff about using the Title attribute, but I feel that if this is
> an NvDA issue, I should not fail these buttons for having a Title
> attribute. They fail for not having descriptive names, but that is a
> different thing. Am I thinking correctly here?
>
> Thanks.
>
> Jim
>
>
>
> ==========
> Jim Homme
> Digital Accessibility
> Bender Consulting Services
> 412-787-8567
>
> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.benderconsult.com_our-2520services_hightest-2Daccessible-2Dtechnology-2Dsolutions&d=DwICAg&c=pLULRYW__RtkwsQUPxJVDGboCTdgji3AcHNJU0BpTJE&r=MMimM36KI-FWX0bnlG1RIV6Bl3MtdwmuKJCwL2Q3WrQ&m=ZG2pRIGwIqxjEr_NoHpltsvF4sQ2WvLWu-S24geJHFs&s=lnDk1kgo_-xoCsU3GSAqkVDcD1kwLmuJtaiFCOaS3kY&e=
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--
*Brian Lovely*
Capital One Digital Accessibility
804.389.1064
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From: Steve Green
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 9:22AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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aria-describedby suffers from the same problem that Jim reported, insofar as screen readers will announce the value of the attribute when you tab to the button but they will not announce it in virtual cursor mode.
If you want to ensure that the information is announced when tabbing and also in virtual cursor mode, you need to use some form of hidden text that is included in the button's name. Critics will say this approach is very old school, but it works and there's actually nothing wrong with it.
FWIW, this isn't likely to be an NVDA issue - I would expect the same behaviour in other screen readers.
Steve Green
Managing Director
Test Partners Ltd
From: Brian Lovely
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 9:25AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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Good catch Steve. I wonder if these buttons are in forms. I doubt if anyone
is filling out forms without using the tab key.
On Fri, Aug 30, 2019 at 11:22 AM Steve Green < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = >
wrote:
> aria-describedby suffers from the same problem that Jim reported, insofar
> as screen readers will announce the value of the attribute when you tab to
> the button but they will not announce it in virtual cursor mode.
>
> If you want to ensure that the information is announced when tabbing and
> also in virtual cursor mode, you need to use some form of hidden text that
> is included in the button's name. Critics will say this approach is very
> old school, but it works and there's actually nothing wrong with it.
>
> FWIW, this isn't likely to be an NVDA issue - I would expect the same
> behaviour in other screen readers.
>
> Steve Green
> Managing Director
> Test Partners Ltd
>
>
>
>
From: Steve Green
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 9:40AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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It depends on their level of proficiency. Experienced screen reader users are happy to tab between fields in forms. They know they are likely to miss any instructions that are in the form, but it's still quicker to tab through and fix any errors after. By contrast, inexperienced users are more likely to use virtual cursor mode because they worry more about the things they might miss.
Steve
From: Birkir R. Gunnarsson
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 10:11AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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This basically boils down to how screen readers handle accessible description.
There is no official guidance and no obvious answer to this.
If you always treat accessible description like accessible name and
expose it in all screen reader interactions, why have an accessible
description at all?
I'm not criticizing the concept, it is often very useful, just
pointing out that communicating accessible description to screen
reader users balancing relevancy and verbosity is tricky.
Most screen readerws err on the side of announcing accessible
description either when an element is focused with the tab key or when
the element triggers application/forms mode (e.g. text inputs), if you
have your auto application/forms mode set to on it doesn't matter how
you navigate to such elements, the mode is triggered from browse mode
or tab key navigation.
As to the specific problem, if the button text should be an accessible
name and accessible in all modes, go with aria-label over the title
attribute.
If the button has a descriptive accessible name but this info is
important enough to be available in all modes, use the good ol
visually hidden text to pad the visible label. If you do, make sure to
include necessary punctuation or whitespace to avoid screen reader
pronounciation problems.
On 8/30/19, Steve Green < = EMAIL ADDRESS REMOVED = > wrote:
> It depends on their level of proficiency. Experienced screen reader users
> are happy to tab between fields in forms. They know they are likely to miss
> any instructions that are in the form, but it's still quicker to tab through
> and fix any errors after. By contrast, inexperienced users are more likely
> to use virtual cursor mode because they worry more about the things they
> might miss.
>
> Steve
>
>
>
From: Don Raikes
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 11:33AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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I have seen the same issue with JAWS and aria-describedby.
From: Don Raikes
Date: Fri, Aug 30 2019 11:36AM
Subject: Re: [External Sender] Title Attribute Issue
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As an experienced JAWS user (almost 30 years), I often find myself switching back and forth between forms mode and virtual cursor mode while filling out forms because the forms are just not coded correctly.
So I feel the original usecase for this thread is a valid one.