Re: New SC relating to notifications of content change (was Re: Some thinking around the orientation discussion)

On 12/05/2016 21:27, Sailesh Panchang wrote:
> If it is not a matter of poor usability, i.e. the newly displayed
> content becomes apparent when added, then it is a matter of  ensuring
> it is rendered in an accessible manner.
> ensuring compliance with SC 1.3.1, conveying change in state (4.1.2),
> updating text equivalends (1.1.1), also  that newly added content
> meets 1.3.1, 2.4.3 and SC 2.2.1 (read with 3.2.1 as noted by the SC)
> and of course 3.2.1 / 3.2.2 are sufficient to cover all types of
> content changes listed as examples / being discussed IMO.

If the change is apparent, but rendered somewhere else on the screen, I 
would argue that none of the existing SCs cover that. particularly 
4.1.2's change in state would refer to the state of the control the user 
is currently on...and not the state of something else in the page.

e.g. coming back to the filter form above a list of products or results 
- even if it had an explicit "Go" button (rather than changing things 
dynamically as the user changes the radio buttons, checkboxes, etc), the 
user moves to the button, activates it, new results are dynamically 
loaded...but nothing is announced to the user. They get no clue that 
their activation had any kind of effect, unless they then optimistically 
move to wherever they think the search results/product listing may be.

How the user should be made aware that their action was successful here 
is open...it could be a hidden ARIA live region that announces "Results 
updated - showing 50 of 200" or something, or if appropriate it could 
involve programmatically moving the focus to the start of the new 
content, or bringing up a JavaScript alert(), or playing a sound, or...

The technique itself is irrelevant, but what counts (and what's missing 
in my opinion) is the general idea that the user IS somehow made aware 
of something that happened that they may not be aware of but is actually 
important (and now we'll probably debate the meaning/definition of 
"important" :) )

P
-- 
Patrick H. Lauke

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Received on Thursday, 12 May 2016 21:29:47 UTC