Do we need role application?

I changed the subject of this thread to the related topic that was raised.

We have had some discussion of depricating role application. I do not see 
an open issue. The only action related to role application does not have 
any description (1361 assigned to James Nurthen). The title of that action 
suggests that the description of the role needs to be re-written. So, if 
there is going to be a serious discussion of deprication for ARIA 1.1, 
than it appears we need an issue raised. I will take that as a to-do 
unless someone beats me to it.

Matt King
IBM Senior Technical Staff Member
I/T Chief Accessibility Strategist
IBM BT/CIO - Global Workforce and Web Process Enablement 
Phone: (503) 578-2329, Tie line: 731-7398
mattking@us.ibm.com



From:   Bryan Garaventa <bryan.garaventa@ssbbartgroup.com>
To:     "Schnabel, Stefan" <stefan.schnabel@sap.com>, Marco Zehe 
<mzehe@mozilla.com>, "lisa.seeman" <lisa.seeman@zoho.com>, James Craig 
<jcraig@apple.com>, 
Cc:     Cynthia Shelly <cyns@microsoft.com>, "White, Jason J" 
<jjwhite@ets.org>, Fred Esch/Arlington/IBM@IBMUS, Matthew 
King/Fishkill/IBM@IBMUS, "Steve Faulkner" <faulkner.steve@gmail.com>, 
Joanmarie Diggs <jdiggs@igalia.com>, "W3C WAI Protocols & Formats" 
<public-pfwg@w3.org>
Date:   11/12/2014 11:00 AM
Subject:        RE: First draft of ARIA 1.1. "text" role



>but role=application will be likely deprecated in ARIA 1.1.
 
Sorry, this sort of jumped out at me. Is role=application supposed to be 
deprecated?
 
If yes, there needs to be something equivalent to allow for controls to 
have keystrokes directly passed through to the control that has focus, 
which is what role=application currently provides. Otherwise custom 
composite interactive controls that require the use of the arrow keys and 
other navigational keystrokes won’t work properly for screen reader users, 
because they will otherwise intercept these keys and not pass them 
through.
 
 
From: Schnabel, Stefan [mailto:stefan.schnabel@sap.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, November 12, 2014 1:38 AM
To: Marco Zehe; lisa.seeman; James Craig
Cc: Cynthia Shelly; White, Jason J; Fred Esch; Matthew King; Steve 
Faulkner; Joanmarie Diggs; W3C WAI Protocols & Formats
Subject: RE: First draft of ARIA 1.1. "text" role
 
Hi Marco,
 
because (as I have written) from an implementers viewpoint, adding a 
“trigger“ or a member in the list of
roles where ARIA labelling has to be supported (which is what they 
actually do for some but not all roles) is maybe on a higher acceptance 
level.
 
However,
 
<span role=”application” aria-label=”Out of stock – That is  Critical” 
style=”color:red”>Out of Stock</span>
 
will work already, too, but role=application will be likely deprecated in 
ARIA 1.1.
 
Regarding your last post: Applause for the FF / NVDA support of this but I 
do not see any contradiction in emphasizing by role that something is more 
than just plain text. 
 
Best Regards + Troll Greetings
Stefan
 
 
From: Marco Zehe [mailto:mzehe@mozilla.com] 
Sent: Mittwoch, 12. November 2014 10:28
To: Schnabel, Stefan; lisa.seeman; James Craig
Cc: Cynthia Shelly; White, Jason J; Fred Esch; Matthew King; Steve 
Faulkner; Joanmarie Diggs; W3C WAI Protocols & Formats
Subject: Re: First draft of ARIA 1.1. "text" role
 
Hi Stefan,

OK, trolling back:
What makes you think they'll support role="text" if they don't get aria 
labelling right now?

Marco
On 12.11.2014 10:04, Schnabel, Stefan wrote:
Hi Marco,
 
I’m in the mood for some trolling since I don’t understand sometimes 
implementation logic behind.
 
Can you please go ahead and tell FS that they should support aria-label 
(or labelledby, describedby) e.g. in
 
<span aria-label=”Out of stock – That is  Critical” style=”color:red”>Out 
of Stock</span>
 
in ALL their modes (important!) according to the ARIA spec WITHOUT having 
a role applied on the span or on the body?
 
If they refuse, having
 
<span role=”text” aria-label=”Out of stock – That is  Critical” 
style=”color:red”>Out of Stock</span>
 
will make things clearer for the screen readers that there is more than 
just plain text .. namely ARIA-attributed text.
 
Best Regards
Stefan
 
From: Marco Zehe [mailto:mzehe@mozilla.com] 
Sent: Mittwoch, 12. November 2014 09:24
To: lisa.seeman; James Craig
Cc: Cynthia Shelly; White, Jason J; Fred Esch; Matthew King; Steve 
Faulkner; Joanmarie Diggs; W3C WAI Protocols & Formats
Subject: Re: First draft of ARIA 1.1. "text" role
 
+1000 to that, Lisa! Given the history of the web, I think it is safe to 
assume that everything that is nothing else is text, and that text does 
not need its own role. None of the examples I have seen in this thread 
convinced me that this is either necessary nor in any way helpful.

Marco

On 12.11.2014 07:48, lisa.seeman wrote:
My 2 cents 
Each new role we introduce will create a learning curve for authors, many 
of whom will initially apply it incorrectly, killing the user experience, 
until an accessibility consultant tells them how to use it correctly. 
(Assuming the consultant is not also using it inappropriately - this is 
not to be taken for a given.) I say this based on a lot of personal 
experience.
 
If we do not need a new role we should not create it.
 
 
All the best

Lisa Seeman

Athena ICT Accessibility Projects 
LinkedIn, Twitter

 

---- On Wed, 12 Nov 2014 05:15:29 +0200 James Craig<jcraig@apple.com> 
wrote ---- 

> On Nov 11, 2014, at 5:41 PM, Cynthia Shelly <cyns@microsoft.com> wrote: 
> 
> I wonder if it might make more sense to change the definition of 
presentation or none to cover this scenario 
> 
> <p>I <img src="heart.gif" alt="love" role="none"> New York.</p> 
> 
> to read "I love New York" instead of "I New York" 

As Matt alluded, the ARIA 1.0 "presentation" role ("none" is a 1.1 synonym 
role of "presentation") does not expose any attribute or role semantics, 
so this would not expose the text alternative. 

> The glyph scenario is different, because it is text, and is often read 
as a single character. 

I don't think it'd always be limited to a single character. 

> But, do we need a role for that? Would this work instead? 
> 
> <p>I <span aria-label="love">♥</span> New York.</p> 

The role of the span is ambiguous here. Some platforms don't expose the 
span at all, preferring to flatten the selection string, so there is no 
element on which to hang the label. (Though that might just be an 
implementation detail.) 

James