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W3C Roadmap for ARIA
… and beyond
Rich Schwerdtfeger
IBM Distinguished Engineer,
Chair W3C WAI PF ARIA Subteam
© 2006 IBM Corporation
IBM Software Group
Web 2.0 Paradigm Shift

Static Documents


New Content = Page Reload

Navigation limited to
tab and click

Content aggregation from various
resources (Mashups)

Poor Usability for PWDs

Social Collaboration

Potential for increased usability

Accessibility requires an
understanding of GUI accessibility
Rich desktop-like experience through
the browser
 AJAX reduces page reloads
 Tie UI to back-end services
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What is the ARIA Roadmap?
•
A comprehensive gap analysis covering
the interoperability between Web
Content and ATs
•
Plans/technologies/specifications used
to fill the gaps
•
A common strategy for W3C/Industry to
collaborate on the problem
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Accessibility API defines a standard contract between an application
component and an assistive technology
Assistive
Technology
Role
States
Actions
Caret
Selection
Text
Hypertext
Value
Name
Description
Children
Changes
Relations
A
C
C
E
S
S
I
B
L
E
Data
UI
Component
UI
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In any object-based accessibility architecture, Assistive Technologies (AT)'s
communicate with all objects to render an accessible view
Frame
Menu Item
Button
Text
Accessible
Application
Components
Assistive
Technology
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The Roadmap Promise
 Competitive look/feel in Web Application widgets
 Feel like an installed GUI Application
 Improved usability through improved keyboard navigation
 Full-function interoperability with assistive technologies
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Why you need it?
 Competitive look/feel should work like platform GUI
 That kind of interaction in Web pages requires scripting
and styling
 Scripting breaks communication with AT through APIs (unless…)
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Problem Analysis shows opportunity for richer accessibility
 HTML Accessibility depends on tag names
(mixing content and presentation)
 JavaScript creates custom widgets using
HTML, user input, and CSS changing their
meaning and purpose within a Web
application
 HTML lacks the accessibility meta data to
support accessibility APIs for repurposed
HTML content
Browser map to DOM/Accessibility API
AT
*Role
*States
*Actions
Caret
Selection
Text
Hypertext
*Value
Name
Description
*Children
*Relations
C
O
N
T
R
A
C
T
Data
Document
Element
UI
JavaScript is the controller
 Keyboard usability for PWDs is poor
 Almost totally dependent on tabbing
 Non anchors/form elements can’t receive
focus (W3C HTML browser implementation
oversight)
 Users needs keyboard navigation and
widget behavior like a GUI
 User needs consistent navigation landmark
semantics to reduce usability problem
-Manipulates the data (DOM) -Manipulates the style (UI)
-Manipulates the content
-Event Driven
- Produces Custom Widgets
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The “Rich Internet Application Accessibility Problem”
Repurposed HTML lacks semantics and ability to give focus
example: menu wanna be
 Accessibility Problems

Can’t get here effectively with the keyboard

Don’t know a menu has been activated

Usability poor as does not behave like a menu

Usability Problem extends beyond accessibility

Alternative content is expensive
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“The Contract” AT Access to Accessible Application
Information as seen by Assistive Technology today
(if the user could get to Top Stories)
Role
(what it is)
May throw this
away
State
Name
Actions
Parent
Non deterministic
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Document Navigation Problem
Dependence on excessive tabbing makes keyboard access
unusable
 Accessibility/Usability Problems

Portal keyboard usability a problem

To get to Market report you need to tab through
every link on the page

Alternatives are a hack to code sections as
headers restricting UI or assign access keys

Alternative is inconsistent across web sites

Alternative provides little semantic information

Use of keyboard short cut (Access Key)
introduces device dependencies
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Filling the gaps
 XHTML 1.X (Extensibility through use of XML namespaces)
 New States and Properties Module for Accessible Rich Internet Applications
(WAI-ARIA States and Properties)
 XHTML Role attribute module
 Role attribute
 Common landmarks (navigation, search, main, secondary, note, seealso, contentinfo, search, banner)
 States (checked, expandable, selected) and Properties (describedBy, controllerFor, live)
 TABINDEX modification allowing script to set focus on all elements with or without effecting tab order)
 New Roles for Accesible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA Roles)
 Role (button, tabpanel, grid, etc.)
 Work with User Agents (Industry) make work with ATs
 Map new meta data to Accessibility API
 Implement (TABINDEX=-1) to support focus to non-anchor and form elements
 <div tabindex=“-1” role = wairole:menuitem waistate:disabled=“true”>
 Leading to broader industry curb cuts
 SVG accessibility
 Device Independence (Content adaptation for devices)
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“The Contract” AT Access to Accessible Application
New Information as seen by Assistive Technology
 New accessibility Information
Role
Menu Item
State
Selected
Name
Top Stories
Actions
None
Parent
Menu
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Role Taxonomy – Innovation allows for extensibility
•
Taxonomy of Roles
–
–
Widgets (grid, menu, spinbutton, etc.)
Structure (group, presentation, application, td, th)
•
RDF/OWL Class hierarchy
•
Roles define properties
•
Allow for custom componentry
•
Allow for future discovery
•
Allow for future adaptation
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States and Properties for ARIAs
 Typical widget states
 checked, selected, disabled, currentvalue, expanded, etc.
 Relationships
 describeby, controls, flowto, labeledby, owns
 New AJAX properties
 live (off, polite, assertive, rude)
 relevant (additions, deletions, text, all)
 atomic
 Miscellaneous
 sort (ascending, descending)
 setsize, posinset
 Datatype
 role
 tabindex
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Demo
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Assembling the parts to help developer and user

Reusable, Accessible Component Libraries
●
●



Producing RIAs (Dojo, Rational JWL, Oracle)
W3C has HTML implementation technique for XHTML standard
Browser support

Firefox 1.5, 2.0 (Window-Eyes support)

Firefox 3.0 to support full spec. (Windows and Linux)

MS IE members have joined WAI PF working group
ATV support

Window-Eyes, JAWS 8 beta for FF 1.5/2.0

ZoomText in progress
Tools
●
●
●
University of Illinois Mozilla/Firefox Accessibility Extension
Eventually – IBM Model-based authoring tools
IBM Research - RAVEN
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Roadmap – Declarative Markup Opportunities
 XForms – Inherent accessibility features results in smaller footprint
 Standard data model from which many states and properties can be mapped automatically by the
browser
 Support for hint text, labels, descriptions
 Declarative markup means less code goes to client
 XML Events and Handlers – allow for named actions
 Declarative way for defining events and handlers
 Handlers can be named to map to action accessibility API
 XHTML 2 access element
 Offers device independent alternative to access key
 Offers semantic navigation using roles
 Allows for a degree of backward compatability
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Current Legislation says You will turn off JavaScript and CSS!
(JavaScript/CSS is on over 50% of all web pages)
Not happening; usable access is too important!
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JavaScript/CSS adoption impacts compliance strategy
while standards/legislation adapt
•
Some Geos still follow WCAG 1.0
–
–
Run with JavaScript and CSS disabled
Decision based on 1999 browser technology
•
U.S. 508 says run without CSS
•
Forcing some companies to provide
alternative content
•
New 508/WCAG 2.0 focus on
–
–
•
Interoperability, usability vs.
technology exclusion
Harmonization between web, rich GUI
Legislation temporarily impacting
business decisions
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Going beyond current W3C standards
•
Consistent keyboard style guide
•
Accessibility API Enhancements
•
–
Rich document editing
–
Exposure of taxonomy class information
Personalization
–
New IMS Global Learning Consortium standards
(ACCMD and ACCLIP specs.)
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References
 W3C Roadmap and Standards
 http://www.w3.org/wai/pf
 Examples
 http://webally.com
 http://www.weba11y.com/AjaxDemo/sample.html
 http://developer.mozilla.org/en/docs/Accessible_DHTML
 http://firefox.cita.uiuc.edu/test/dhtml/src/index.php
 Tooling in development
 U. of Illinois extension
http://firefox.cita.uiuc.edu/dhtml/download.php
 RAVEN
http://www.alphaworks.ibm.com/tech/raven
 WAI Role Taxonomy extension tool

http://test2.ubapps.com/RolesWebApp/roles/start
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Thank you
© 2006 IBM Corporation