Accesibility help! Hover state not activating on tab, objects not appearing as tabbed over/selected

Jun 08, 2020

I am using version Storyline version 3.35 and the hover is not recognizing the people/objects. When I update to the next version, it recognizes the objects but not the text box anymore. I understand the latest updates changes how tabbing over text boxes works, this is why I use 3.35.

 

My issue is I need both to highlight and I need the states to change on hover when tabbed. Is there anyone that could help me figure this out?

5 Replies
Sam Hill

Hi Elizabeth, I have had the issue before regarding the Tab focus on objects on the older versions of SL. I found this to be a bug and in some instances I had to recreate the object, or sometimes trigger a hover state when the element was tabbed to.

We have moved to the latest version of Storyline for accessibility now. We held off for a while just to make sure it was OK before we started to publish our course in it.

Our testing of the latest version has been good. Regarding tab focus around text boxes, this isn't actually necessary to read the text content, it's not really how people using screen readers experience web pages. The tab focus on text fields is not necessary, but is necessary on interactive elements to show they have focus. Text is read using the arrow keys to navigate the content (not the Tab key).

I would recommend updating to the latest version as soon as you are comfortable in doing so as there have been some good improvements to accessibility and the Tab focus does not seem to be a problem any longer.

Articulate are also talking about semantic mark-up this sometime this year which will be a massive improvement.

Elizabeth W.

Thank you, Sam. I am trying out the latest version of Storyline now. To address my 2nd issue, is there a way for tabbing to work to activate hover states? This was working previously but now, even using the latest Storyline, tabbing is not activating hover states like the mouse does. The attached photo shows tabbed item with square is not activating hover, but next to it my mouse is hovered and item has changed states.

Sam Hill

Hi Elizabeth, tabbing doesn't activate hover states without adding triggers. Storyline has always handled Tab focus by adding a large yellow box around the element that has focus. This tab focus will show around elements that are clickable. It will no longer show around text elements as they no longer receive Tab focus which is a good thing.

If you wanted to add the hover state to the element when it has Tab focus, there is a bit of work involved, as the state does not revert back to Normal easily.

You would have to have the State change to Hover on Key Press "Tab". You would then most likely have to include triggers to change the state of the other buttons back to Normal.

Whilst the yellow box isn't aesthetically pleasing it does provide good contrast for visually impaired users, or no visually impaired who are using a keyboard to access content.

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