RE: divs and screen readers

Here is a simple rule of thumb to follow:

Screen readers always read the text in the literal order that it appears in
the code. 

With stylesheets, you can rearrange the visual order all you want without
changing the order in the code, but it is the order of the text in the code
that matters to screen readers. Just pretend that all of your HTML tags are
gone (<p>, <div>, <span>, <table>, <td>, etc.). What you're left with is the
linearized reading order that screen readers pay attention to.

Paul Bohman
Technology Coordinator
WebAIM (Web Accessibility in Mind)
www.webaim.org
Center for Persons with Disabilities
www.cpd.usu.edu
Utah State University
www.usu.edu 


-----Original Message-----
From: w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org [mailto:w3c-wai-ig-request@w3.org] On Behalf
Of Julia Collins
Sent: Thursday, July 10, 2003 8:47 AM
To: Lauke PH; w3c-wai-ig@w3.org
Subject: Re: divs and screen readers



Hi

I've been replying privately to people with the url because this site is
under development, and I'm a bit wary of unleashing the full force of this
list (scary thought) on something that is trying (but has by no means yet
fully succeeded) to get it right.

But that is cowardly.  So (Deep breath) here is the url of the development
site.

http://www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/site01.cfm?request=a600

Yes, I know there is some nasty javascript rollovers which are soon going to
be replaced by css controlled text ones. Also, part of the deal is that it
is written using Brighton & Hove Council's cf based web authoring tool,
which is fine, but it puts some of the code out of the developers' hands and
generates some really spaced out and weird looking code.

But please, please, please, if anyone has anything to report on how screen
readers interpret this - if they get the same problems the testers have been
experiencing - please get back to me.

With deep gratitude

Julia

On 10/7/03 3:16 pm, "Lauke   PH" <P.H.Lauke@salford.ac.uk> wrote:

> 
> Julia,
> 
> I'll echo what was said before and ask: can we see the code (or at 
> least a similar page that is proven to exhibit the same problem) ?
> 
> Patrick
> ________________________________
> Patrick H. Lauke
> Webmaster / University of Salford
> http://www.salford.ac.uk
>

Received on Thursday, 10 July 2003 18:41:07 UTC