Fwd: Custom stylesheet question for LVTF

Hi LVTF,
We have a request for thoughts.
let's respond to the list.

Jim


---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Wilco Fiers <wilco.fiers@deque.com>
Date: Thu, Apr 16, 2020 at 4:48 AM
Subject: Custom stylesheet question for LVTF
To: <jimallan@tsbvi.edu>


Hey Jim,

The ACT-Rules community group had a question we wanted to get input on from
the LVTF, I wasn't sure what channel to use to communicate. Please let me
know if I need to go somewhere else for this.

The question is about custom stylesheets and as to whether or not code like
this is a problem:

<div role="list">
  <li>Some content</li>
</div>


WCAG is a little vague on what should and shouldn't be expected from
someone using custom stylesheets. I know tools like Stylish are relatively
popular still to tweak the styles of a website, but it's pretty complicated
to write a good custom stylesheet, especially if you want to make a robust
one, which is where the above example comes in.

So our question breaks down into two;

1. How important does LVTF think custom stylesheets are, given how complex
things have gotten To what extent does LVTF think page styles need to be
configurable? How far does 1.3.1 go? I would expect it to include things
like allowing changes at the element level, like tweaking font size, color,
borders, spacing, etc. But what about more complex things like changing the
layout of a menu, or to customise the style of a list?

2. What level of effort is reasonable to expect from someone using a custom
stylesheet? If I with my custom stylesheet want to make sure all lists are
marked up a certain way, is it reasonable to expect all lists to follow the
HTML spec, or should the author of the custom stylesheet be expected to
create a robust custom stylesheet which tries to anticipate odd uses of ul,
ol and li elements?


For the example above, where ARIA is used in combination with a native HTML
element, this is a programatically determined relationship, but it's
invalid HTML; li elements must be contained in a ul, ol or menu element. I
suspect this passes SC 1.3.1, but I don't think it is particularly
reasonable to expect the author of a custom stylesheet to anticipate all
the odd ways ARIA can interact with native elements.


So, long story, sorry about that, but it's a complicated question. I hope
my explanation of it is clear enough. Please do ask if this needs further
elaboration, or if I need to send this somewhere else.

Thanks for our time,


-- 
*Wilco Fiers*
Axe for Web product owner - Co-facilitator WCAG-ACT - Chair ACT-R



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