Re: ACTION-1442: Draft spec text for aria-current and aria-currentfor

Revisions to yesterday's proposal: 

1. Clarified that false and undefined are equivalent and false is the 
default.

2. Clarified that UA should not expose and AT should not convey false or 
undefined.

In the following text, phrases in square brackets are intended to be 
links. 

Aria-current attribute

Indicates an element represents the current item within a container or set 
of related elements.

The aria-current attribute indicates whether an element represents what is 
current (true), or not current (false). If the aria-current attribute is 
false or undefined, User Agents SHOULD NOT expose the aria-current state 
of an element, and assistive technologies SHOULD NOT convey it.

The aria-current attribute is used when one of the elements in a set of 
related elements has a visual style different from other members in the 
set to indicate that the element identifies what is current. For example, 
it can be used to indicate which [link] in a set of [navigation] links is 
visually styled to indicate that it is the link for the currently 
displayed page. Similarly, it can be used to indicate which step in a 
[list] of wizard steps is visually styled to inform the user that the 
currently displayed wizard content is for that step. 

Note: 
When applied to an element contained in a widget that supports selection, 
the meaning of aria-current is different from the meaning of 
[aria-selected]. Authors should not use aria-current in lieu of 
aria-selected and should avoid using aria-current in circumstances where 
the meaning of aria-current would be the same as aria-selected. For 
example, in a single-select [tablist] where the selected [tab] element 
corresponds to the displayed tabpanel, aria-current is unnecessary. 
However, if the selected state of a tab is used to indicate which tab is 
selected for an action, such as move, delete, or display (make current), 
then aria-current should be used to indicate which tab represents the 
currently displayed tabpanel. Examples that further explain how to use 
aria-current and aria-selected are available in the [WAI-ARIA Authoring 
Practices]. 

Characteristics of aria-current 

Used in roles: All elements of the base markup. 

Value: true/false

Values of aria-current 

true: The element is current. 
false (default): The element is not current 

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:   Joseph Scheuhammer <clown@alum.mit.edu>
To:     Matthew King/Fishkill/IBM@IBMUS, Joseph Scheuhammer 
<clown@alum.mit.edu>, 
Cc:     public-pfwg@w3.org
Date:   11/19/2014 09:58 AM
Subject:        Re: ACTION-1442: Draft spec text for aria-current and 
aria-currentfor



Léonie, Matt,

Thanks for your clarifications.

> So, what is the best way to write the text so the undefine/false 
> equivalency is clear? 

For the "Values" table, how about:

"false (default):  The element is not current.
true: The element is current."

I'm following the style of the value tables for other boolean aria-* 
attributes. For example, see the table for aria-disabled 
(http://rawgit.com/w3c/aria/master/aria/aria.html#aria-disabled).

Similarly, for the "Value" entry in the "Characteristics" table:

"Value: true/false"

Also, given that "conveyed by User Agents" has to do with the 
accessibility API, I suggest this re-wording:

"If the aria-current attribute is false or undefined, User Agents SHOULD 
NOT expose the aria-current state of an element, and assistive 
technologies SHOULD NOT convey it."

Hope that helps.

-- 
;;;;joseph.

'Array(16).join("wat" - 1) + " Batman!"'
            - G. Bernhardt -