WCAG-ISSUE-22 (DavidMacD): AIRA Labelledby on link should usually self reference [HTML & ARIA Techniques TF]

WCAG-ISSUE-22 (DavidMacD): AIRA Labelledby on link should usually self reference [HTML & ARIA Techniques TF]

http://www.w3.org/WAI/GL/track/issues/22

Raised by: Shadi Abou-Zahra
On product: HTML & ARIA Techniques TF

It is not desirable to have the link text replaced by the aria-labelledby, because that forbids the screen reader user from knowing what was in the link text. I think our first example should be amended. And then add another example at the end with no self reference if we want. This came up on a call quite a while ago and believe this was what the group thought was best. So for Example 1 we would have:

<h2 id="headline">Storms hit east coast</h2>

<p>Torrential rain and gale force winds have struck the east coast, causing flooding in many coastal towns.
   <a href="news.html" id="p123" aria-labelledby="headline p123" >Read more...</a></p>


I think the paragraph should be changed:
CURRENT
The specified behavior of aria-labelledby is that the associated label text is announced instead of the link text (not in addition to the link text). When the link text itself should be included in the label text, the ID of the link should be referenced as well in the string of IDs forming the value of the aria-labelledby attribute.

PROPOSED
Usually the author will want the associated label text announced *in addition* to the link text. In this case, the ID of the link should be referenced as well in the string of IDs forming the value of the aria-labelledby attribute.
If the author wants the  associated label text announced *instead* of the link text they would simply not include the self referenced ID in the value of the aria-labelledby attribute.

Received on Tuesday, 27 May 2014 22:04:19 UTC