Re: Adding ARIA role="presentation" to a table based CMS

Agreed.

Making it role="presentation" is only a minor tweak to clean up the 
experience in tables that linearize.
It doesn't help with the tables that don't linearize.

- Aaron



From:
"Gez Lemon" <gez.lemon@gmail.com>
To:
Aaron M Leventhal/Cambridge/IBM@IBMUS
Cc:
joshue.oconnor@cfit.ie, Richard Schwerdtfeger/Austin/IBM@IBMUS, 
"w3c-wai-pf@w3.org PF" <w3c-wai-pf@w3.org>, w3c-wai-pf-request@w3.org, 
"W3C WAI-XTECH" <wai-xtech@w3.org>
Date:
11/05/2008 08:25 AM
Subject:
Re: Adding ARIA role="presentation" to a table based CMS



Hi Aaron,

> The technique works for most of the sites I've seen. Generally if a form 
is
> lined up by using a <table>, each form control has its own <tr>. 
Threfore
> the contents will be exposed to ATs in the correct order.

Yes, that's an example of a table that linearises correctly.
Generally, that kind of table isn't going to cause accessibility
issues, as it linearises correctly, and the table information is lost
when in forms mode (or equivalent cursor mode). The kind of tables
that do cause accessibility issues are those where the data doesn't
linearise, such as having a navigation item as part of a larger layout
table, so the items are visited out of context.

As I mentioned in my original reply, I do see a use for
role="presentation", but the major accessibility issue with layout
tables is with tables that don't linearise. Declaring the table
presentational isn't going to help those cases, as the elements will
still be out of order.

Cheers,

Gez


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