JAWS/NVDA reading buttons w/Visited/Selected states as "The Right Thing" regardless of alt. text/button labels

Jun 18, 2021

We're having a persistent problem with Visited/Selected buttons (e.g. Knowledge Check custom buttons, Review Quiz button, etc.) being read as "The Right Thing", no matter what the button labels or alt. text set for the buttons read. This has occurred in multiple elearning courses we've developed in various versions of Storyline 360.

I set aside some time to see if I could troubleshoot this issue in some of our Team Slide templates, but couldn't identify a possible cause.

I checked the following elements:

  • Timeline - all looks normal
  • States - all looks normal
  • KC questions in both Form View and Slide View - all looks normal
  • Triggers - nothing out of the ordinary
  • Player Properties dialog's Text Labels and scrolled through all of them - no "Right Thing"
  • Accessibility dialog's alt text field - all looks normal
  • Focus Order--nothing out of the ordinary there, either

Has anyone else encountered this issue and identified a possible cause/solution for it?

3 Replies
Becca Levan

Hello Michelle!

Thanks for reaching out and sharing these details! It sounds like you've already spent a lot of time testing things to find answers. 

From here, I'm going to enlist our support engineers to step in and help troubleshoot. I've created a support case on your behalf, so stay tuned for an email from one of my teammates with a next step. No worries, we'll help shed some light on this!

Michelle Kenoyer

Hi Becca!

So a very nice colleague of yours, an Articulate Support engineer, relayed that we need to view and edit the alt. text for a button’s different states—a button’s alt. text in the Focus Order dialog ONLY reflects the Default state’s setting—it does NOT reflect the alt. text for the button’s other states, which can each have their own alt. text.

Thus, it is necessary and important to investigate and modify the alt. text for the different button, icon, etc. states in an interaction. To do this:

  1. Click Edit States for the slide that contains the button or buttons.
  2. Select the state you want to edit. On the slide, right-click the button for the selected state.
  3. In the shortcut menu that appears, click Accessibility.
  4. Make sure the alt. text reflects what the button or icon label reads, and then click Close.

The alt. text for the Selected state for the button in question had the offending "The Right Thing" text, which I wouldn't have seen if I'd relied only on looking at the button's Default state's alt. text, which is what I'd been doing before. A nice bit of information I learned today! :)