(X)HTML Techniques (Techniques XML Submission Form)

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Submission Results:

Technology: (X)HTML Techniques 
Techniques Category: Forms 
Submitter's Name: Becky Gibson 
Submitter's Email: gibsonb@us.ibm.com

<technique id="UNKNOWN">
<short-name>15.3 The title attribute to label form controls</short-name>
<applies-to>
 <guideline idref="" />
 <success-criterion idref="UNKNOWN" />
</guideline

</applies-to>

<task>
<p>Use title to label form controls that can't be individually labeled.</p>
</task>

<description>
There may be instances when related controls may not be separately labeled.  A textual description on the page may make it obvious to a sighted user what information should be entered into the fields.  Without a label associated with a control a screen reader user who navigates directly to the control, would not know what information needs to be entered. It is generally better to associate an explicit label with each form control. Where it is not practical to have a label tag associated with a control due to layout or other contraints, the title attribute of the input element can be used to identify the function of the control.

  

</description>

<user-issues>
 <affects group="UNKNOWN" />
</user-issues>

<eg-group>
<description>
Because there no label elements associated with them, the following input text fields each have a title attribute describing the data to be entered into the field.

</description>

<code><![CDATA[
<p>

Enter name (first, middle, last): 

<input  type="text" size="10" title="enter first name" name="first" />

<input  type="text" size="10" title="enter middle name" name="middle" />

<input  type="text" size="15" title="enter last name" name="last" />

</p>
]]</code>

<ua-issues>
This example was tested with the following screen readers in Internet Explorer 6.01 sp1 on Windows 2000:

JAWS 4.51 and WindowEyes 4.51 sp3 both read the title in normal reading mode and when navigating directly from control to control

Home Page Reader 3.02 does not read the title when in item reading mode but does read the title in control reading mode.
</ua-issues>
</eg-group>

<resources>
</resources>
</technique>

Additional Notes:

Note, there is already a task for using titles on controls in the HTML tecniques docuement but no example. This submission provides example code.

Received on Wednesday, 29 September 2004 20:00:21 UTC