From a talk given at She Codes Brighton's Tech in 10 in March, 2015
WAI-ARIA in 10Laura Kalbag@laurakalbag @indie
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Why is web accessibility important?
Accessibility makes the web a goodexperience for as many people as possible
Accessibility isn’t just aboutscreen readers
Web accessibility is built on a foundationof meaningful HTML
Hall Kitchen … Hall Kitchen Meaningful vs not-so meaningful HTML
Screen readers
Hall Kitchen … list 2 items••internal, link, Hallinternal, link, Kitchenend of listHow VoiceOver reads it
Hall Kitchen internal, link, Hallinternal, link, KitchenHow VoiceOver reads it
What is WAI-ARIA?
Web Accessibility Initiative –Accessible Rich Internet Applications(or ARIA for short)Born March 2013
Dynamic content / “complex web apps”(Sites that update withoutrefreshing the page)
ARIA is particularly useful for keyboardnavigation and screen readers
Tabs
TabsWAI-ARIA Overview, selected, tab, 1 of 3Laura Kalbag, tab, 2 of 3Ind.ie, tab, 3 of 3
visited, link, Imageslink, Fontslink, Ways To Paylink, Offerslink, Ideaslink, Subscriptions
Web browsers need a few more cues toassist the human
ARIA is a layer on top of markupcontentstructure (HTML)additional structure (ARIA)
WAI-ARIA gives developers a way todescribe roles, states, and properties forcustom widgets
ImagesARIA Roles
tab, Imagestab, Fontstab, Ways To Paytab, Offerstab, Ideastab, Subscriptions
ARIA Roles vs Implied RolesImages Images, buttonImages tab, Images
Incorrect password, please try again Successfully savedOther rolesFull list at http://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria/roles#abstract_roles_header
aria-‐selected="true">ImagesARIA Stateshttp://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria/states_and_properties#aria-selected
tab, Images, selectedtab, Fontstab, Ways To Paytab, Offerstab, Ideastab, Subscriptions
Expanding/collapsing menu aria-‐expanded="false"> aria-‐expanded="true">Menu, collapsed, button Menu, expanded, button
ARIA Landmarks
When we shouldn’t use WAI-ARIA
HTML5 vs Landmarks http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/infrastructure.html#default-implicit-aria-semantics
ARIA vs HTML http://www.paciellogroup.com/blog/2010/04/html5-and-the-myth-of-wai-aria-redundance/
ARIA should be your last resort
However, there’s a lot ARIA can do,that HTML can’t…
Live Regions
New tweets available. Press period to review them. New Tweets available. Press period to review them.
Without ARIA, people can miss out
http://caniuse.com/#search=WAI-ARIA
http://html5accessibility.com by The Paciello Group
ARIA can’t fix an unusable site
Thank you!@laurakalbag@indie