RE: Moving focus with a screen reader and switch access control - is there a difference?

FAO: The WAI IG

I am currently undertaking accessibility tests using an Android Nexus 5 on a responsive web site using the Firefox mobile browser 62.0.3.

I tested a particular page and the focus with a green box could be moved to every option on the page using Talkback and a single swipe gesture left or right. However, when using the Switch Access Control (Next & Previous mapped to hard volume up & down buttons) only one option on the same web page could be navigated to using the default red box focus.

This prompted the question: is there a difference in the way a screen reader and switch access control operate when accessing the DOM, what is actually taking place under the hood, particularly for the switch access control?

I have tried to find this out on the web without success. I would value help in understanding this further.

Many thanks,

Neil.

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Neil Rogers
ID: 27222853
University of Southampton
Electronics and Computer Science,
Web and Internet Science Group, Building 32
http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/people/nrer1g14