Re: How can a countdown timer for an online test conform to WCAG 2.1

We tend to recommend 5 and 10 minute warnings announce via alerts, just so
long as the announcement isn't persistent. (I saw one timer that announced
every time the second update, but took longer than a second to announce the
time remaining, so eventually the announced time was many minutes off of
the actual time. An ARIA alert isn't quite enough, but it should also be
easily discoverable. Consider coding the timer text as a heading element to
be a heading for easy access whenever a candidate wants to know how much
time is remaining via the screen reader heading list.

Levon

On Tue, Jul 21, 2020, 8:26 AM Dan Horning <dsoundmn@gmail.com> wrote:

> Christophe
>
> I feel it would be simpler, since likely those that would be distracted by
> such a timer are eligible for accommodation, to not have the countdowns for
> them? But if you did have to - maybe the shortcut key in combination with a
> preset to notify them either at specific time remaining (say every 15 or 30
> seconds) or when they press a hotkey. The user could select their choice of
> key or time interval on the settings page you mentioned.
>
> Just ideas here - nothing tested yet.
>
> *Dan Horning*
> *518-285-0531*
>
>
> On Tue, Jul 21, 2020 at 7:21 AM Christophe Strobbe <
> strobbe@hdm-stuttgart.de> wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I am auditing a site for online assessments. Each assessment has a
>> countdown timer for the remaining time. The countdown timer consists of
>> three parts in source code order: (1) an animated SVG that fills a circle
>> with a different colour as time is used up, (2) a textual countdown for
>> remaining minutes and seconds that is updated every second, and (3) the
>> label "Remaining time".
>>
>> The two main issues I currently see are the following:
>>
>> (1) Marking this with aria-live=polite would probably still be too
>> disruptive for screenreader users who are thinking how to solve a specific
>> question, even if the update frequency were reduced from every second to
>> every minute.
>> (2) The animation is an issue for people with certain attention disorders
>> (SC 2.2.2).
>> (3) You would probably want the label to be read out before the remaining
>> time, but that should be easy to fix (e.g. using aria-labelledby).
>>
>>
>> For the first issue, one might offer a keyboard shortcut that allows
>> screenreader users to get to the remaining time indicator; this would also
>> require a keyboard shortcut that takes you back to what you were working
>> on. (This assumes that the countdown timer has aria-live=off, but this is
>> already implicit in role=timer.)
>>
>> For the first issue, I can imagine an option on the initial screen that
>> allows you to choose a lower update frequency and to turn of the SVG
>> animation. (The site I am auditing already has an initial screen where test
>> takes need to choose between a male or female role, so no additional page
>> would need to be created for this.)
>>
>> I wonder if people on this list have any thoughts on these suggestions or
>> perhaps better ideas.
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Christophe Strobbe
>>
>