Dialog layers - I wonder if I am building them correctly?

Apr 04, 2023

I am finding myself confused about dialog layers. I understand that they automatically grey out the base layer and prevent user from clicking on base layer objects, but beyond that, I feel like I am missing something.

In the attached sample story, I pulled in a template and added a button to trigger a dialog layer. Then added text to the layer. I thought perhaps the system would automatically provide the "close layer" functionality, but I didn't see that it does, so I added a button to close the layer. It would be nice if the layer provided one automatically like the quiz questions when you try and skip them.

Then, I just don't grasp the purpose of the "label" and "description" options in the drop down menu when you select the layer Properties. The options just include the objects on the layer, but the screen reader already reads those objects. How does adding a label and description benefit the user? By "description," I thought that perhaps I can add a custom description for some purpose, but doesn't seem to function this way.

Any insight or guidance you can provide is greatly appreciated. I was hoping to use dialog layers to save time and improve accessibility, but other than the automatic grey out and preventing base layer clicking, I don't see other benefits. Am I missing something? If not, the two functionalities mentioned above is still a nice enhancement and can save a bit of time I recognize.

dialog_layer.story

7 Replies

Eric Santos
Staff

1 year ago04/05/23 at 7:46 pm (UTC)

Hi Jennifer,

I'm sorry about the confusion regarding Dialog layers in Storyline 360. Like regular layers, you must add a trigger to Dialog layers to Hide the layer, similar to what is shown below.

Hide layer trigger

This allows course authors to choose how to close a slide or dialog layer. Whether by clicking a button after finishing a task or when the layer's timeline ends

Here are the alt text options and information on their purpose and how to use them:

Label provides text for the aria-labelledby accessibility attribute. This tells the screen reader what to announce as the modal dialog title.
Description provides text for the aria-describedby accessibility attribute. This tells the screen reader what to announce for the purpose of the modal dialog.

Please check out this article for more details:

Storyline 360: Dialog Layers

Let me know if you have other questions!

Jesi Watts

9 months ago08/11/23 at 8:34 pm (UTC)

I had a question about this as well. I see that i must provide a trigger of some sort to close the layer but do dialog features work with the hover feature? If i hover away from an object on the base layer will it automatically close?

Walt Hamilton
Hero

9 months ago08/12/23 at 6:29 pm (UTC)

Subscribing to see what happens when you try it.

9 months ago08/15/23 at 3:03 pm (UTC)

Hi Jesi!

Happy to jump in here!

Dialog layers dim everything else in the browser window, and learners can't interact with anything else in the course while it's open. To return to the slide content, learners must engage with the dialog layer by closing it or completing a task.

If there's an object on the base layer with a trigger related to a hover state, it would not function while the dialog layer is open.

Please let me know if you have any more questions!

Barry Stoner

8 months ago09/05/23 at 8:10 am (UTC)

Hi Eric and Steven, I'm finding NVDA does not read out the Label automatically like it used to.

I'm currently using Build 3.78.30747.0 and tried upgrading to the latest Build 3.79.30834.0, but when the dialog opens nothing is read out until I press the down arrow. Unfortunately, NVDA is skipping the title on the dialog which I set at the Label. It used to read this out automatically.

Thanks.