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Bug 13621 - Allow user agents flexibility to meet user needs
Summary: Allow user agents flexibility to meet user needs
Status: RESOLVED INVALID
Alias: None
Product: HTML WG
Classification: Unclassified
Component: LC1 HTML5 spec (show other bugs)
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All All
: P2 normal
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Greg Lowney
QA Contact: HTML WG Bugzilla archive list
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords: a11y
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2011-08-03 19:32 UTC by Greg Lowney
Modified: 2012-01-11 18:56 UTC (History)
8 users (show)

See Also:


Attachments

Description Greg Lowney 2011-08-03 19:32:00 UTC
Giving the user control over their experience, allowing them to interact in ways that work for them, is a fundamental principle of accessible design.

There are places where the HTML5 spec is overly restrictive at to exactly how user agents must present content and handle user interactions. Sometimes such restrictions are necessary, and in many other places the spec acknowledges that user agent behavior may vary to adapt to its nature, platform, or user needs. However, in some places the user agent is not given this flexibility, possibly by simple oversight. If these are not corrected, user agents would be unable to fully accommodate some users without becoming technically noncompliant. 

This is a broad issue and subsidiary bugs may be entered for specific instances.

Use case: Nadia is blind and using a web browser with a screen reader. The document contains a menu structure created with the HTML5 menu element, and it includes some very long menus with many groups of menu items separated by horizontal rules into various groups or sections. As Nadia uses the down arrow key to navigate through the menu items, she has to pause for each one to be read to her, so traversing a long menu takes a long time and a lot of effort. She would prefer to have the menu presented to her in hierarchical fashion that uses progressive disclosure, so she could navigate through the short list of sections, and then through the short list of commands in the desired section, rather than through one long list of items.

Use case: Aidan is the opposite of Nadia. He uses an alternative input system and input is difficult for him, so he wants to reduce the number of actions he has to take. Therefore he prefers to see all the options visible at once so that he can choose one directly, rather than having to use mechanisms involving progressive disclosure. (He has even invested in a large, high-resolution monitor to support this work style.) Rather than choosing a sub-menu and then items from them, he'd rather have all the sub-menus and their items displayed together. Unfortunately, the HTML5 specification explicitly states that the menu element with a label must be presented as a sub-menu rather than displayed inline.
Comment 1 Michael[tm] Smith 2011-08-04 05:35:04 UTC
mass-move component to LC1
Comment 2 Benjamin Hawkes-Lewis 2011-08-04 06:55:33 UTC
(In reply to comment #0)

> Use case: Nadia is blind and using a web browser with a screen reader. The
> document contains a menu structure created with the HTML5 menu element, and it
> includes some very long menus with many groups of menu items separated by
> horizontal rules into various groups or sections. As Nadia uses the down arrow
> key to navigate through the menu items, she has to pause for each one to be
> read to her, so traversing a long menu takes a long time and a lot of effort.
> She would prefer to have the menu presented to her in hierarchical fashion that
> uses progressive disclosure, so she could navigate through the short list of
> sections, and then through the short list of commands in the desired section,
> rather than through one long list of items.
> 
> Use case: Aidan is the opposite of Nadia. He uses an alternative input system
> and input is difficult for him, so he wants to reduce the number of actions he
> has to take. Therefore he prefers to see all the options visible at once so
> that he can choose one directly, rather than having to use mechanisms involving
> progressive disclosure. (He has even invested in a large, high-resolution
> monitor to support this work style.) Rather than choosing a sub-menu and then
> items from them, he'd rather have all the sub-menus and their items displayed
> together. Unfortunately, the HTML5 specification explicitly states that the
> menu element with a label must be presented as a sub-menu rather than displayed
> inline.

Could you please cite the text in the spec that prevents conforming user agents meeting these use-cases? I think you may be confusing text describing what HTML markup represents with text describing how what it represents must be presented to the user.
Comment 3 Anne 2011-08-15 16:10:49 UTC
Please do not file meta bugs. File bugs on specific issues.