Re: Required Form Fields Question

It appears to be exposed properly in the accessibility tree from what I've seen using MSAA/UIA, and it's announced properly using JAWS, NVDA, and VoiceOver as the three primary screen readers. I'd be surprised if it didn't work using TalkBack as well on the Android, or in ChromeVox in Chrome.
 
I'm not sure about ZoomText since it's not something I use personally. It's worth verifying though if anybody has it running.

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Jonathan Avila 
  To: Bryan Garaventa ; Christophe Strobbe ; w3c-wai-ig@w3.org 
  Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2014 9:43 AM
  Subject: RE: Required Form Fields Question


  [Bryan wrote] The aria-required attribute works in IE8 through 11, FF, Chrome, and Safari.



  Can you clarify what you mean by works?  Is it exposed through the accessibility API (MSAA, UIA, etc.) or detected by assistive technologies such as NVDA, JAWS, ZoomText, etc. when used with these browsers.  I think it's important to consider both scenarios.



  Best Regards,



  Jonathan



  From: Bryan Garaventa [mailto:bryan.garaventa@whatsock.com] 
  Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2014 12:37 PM
  To: Christophe Strobbe; w3c-wai-ig@w3.org
  Subject: Re: Required Form Fields Question



  The aria-required attribute works in IE8 through 11, FF, Chrome, and Safari.



    ----- Original Message ----- 

    From: Christophe Strobbe 

    To: w3c-wai-ig@w3.org 

    Sent: Thursday, March 06, 2014 9:30 AM

    Subject: Re: Required Form Fields Question



    Hi Geri,

    On 6/03/2014 18:22, Druckman,Geri wrote:

      Easiest way to make sure  screen reader users know a certain field is required, in my opinion, is to add aria-required="true" to the input tag.


    According to <http://www.html5accessibility.com/> HTML5's required attribute was already supported by Firefox 15 and Chrome 21 but not accessibility-supported by Internet Explorer 10. 
    Is aria-required better supported by assistive technologies? 

    Best regards,

    Christophe





    For example for a first name text field:

    <input id="first-name" type="text" maxlength="50" value="" name="rel_first" aria-required="true" ></input>



    I also recommended, here at MD Anderson, since most of our forms can get pretty lengthly, to add at the beginning of the form "All fields are required except those marked as optional.", and then only mark the optional fields with the word "Optional".  Makes it clearer and cleaner.





    Geri Druckman

    Web Development Specialist - Accessibility

    Department of Internet Services

    MD Anderson Cancer Center

    T 713-792-6293 | F 713-745-8134



    From: <Homme>, James <james.homme@highmark.com>
    Date: Thursday, March 6, 2014 10:55 AM
    To: "w3c-wai-ig@w3.org" <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
    Subject: Required Form Fields Question
    Resent-From: <w3c-wai-ig@w3.org>
    Resent-Date: Thursday, March 6, 2014 10:56 AM



    Hi,

    If a required field symbol is on screen, immediately to the left of a form field, but outside the label tag, so that a screen reader user has to exit Form mode to see it, does that violate that a required field must be programmibly determined? 

    Thanks.

    Jim



-- Christophe StrobbeAkademischer MitarbeiterAdaptive User Interfaces Research GroupHochschule der MedienNobelstraße 1070569 StuttgartTel. +49 711 8923 2749