RE: AT support for role="application"

I also would highly appreciate an answer to Srinivas' question.

 

The automatic switch of modes for application role should be supplied by
all AT but I also recognized that the concrete implementation has been
still NOT done in the major screen readers.

 

-       Stefan

 

From: wai-xtech-request@w3.org [mailto:wai-xtech-request@w3.org] On
Behalf Of Srinivas Annam
Sent: Montag, 14. Juli 2008 19:21
To: wai-xtech@w3.org; dev-accessibility@lists.mozilla.org
Subject: AT support for role="application"

 

Hi all,

I am trying to understand the functionality of application role and what
the current support of AT is for the same. From the w3 description (at
http://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria/#application) once role="application" is
specified AT would set the user into non-browse mode and pass arrow and
other key strokes straight to the the application so the application can
support keyboard functionality.

To verify the behavior I tried the spreadsheet example
<http://www.mozilla.org/access/dhtml/spreadsheet>  (from mozilla.org)
using FF3 and Window Eyes 6.1. While WE 6.1 recognized the application
mode and announced "Browse Off" as soon as the page has been rendered,
it continued to stay in browse mode until an explicit focus change
occurred to one of the elements on the body. Is this the expected
behavior of an AT for role="application"? The behavior certainly makes
sense to me, but what threw me off is the fact "Browse Off" has been
announced but I continued to be in browse mode initially. Once I
understood, what it is doing I actually like the resulting user
experience, but want to make that this is the expected behavior.

Also, has anyone tried a combination of application role and document
role on the same page. Any good examples out there that I could play
with? What about other AT, anyone know if JAWS and all has any support
for this or planning to add?

Thanks,
Srinivas

-- 
Srinivas Annam
Software Engineer, Accessibility
Google, Inc.
Cell: 408.898.4928
Email: annams@google.com