Tab Order/Focus in Player

Hi Bruce, 

You can skip player navigation elements—such as the sidebar, seekbar, and previous/next buttons—when you're tabbing through slide objects with a screen reader (Flash output only). Here's how it works:

1. First, you'll tab through the slide objects in the order defined by the content author.
2. When you press the Tab key after the last object on the slide, the screen reader will instruct you to press the spacebar or Enter key if you want to skip player navigation.
   • If you press the spacebar or Enter key, your next tab will jump back to the first object on the slide.
   • If you don't press the spacebar or Enter key, your next tab will proceed to the player navigation.

The option to skip player navigation when using a screen reader is always enabled. You don't need to do anything to activate it. Just install the latest update and publish your course.

In those directions about skipping the navigation buttons...when it states:

"If you press the spacebar or Enter key, your next tab will jump back to the first object on the slide"

Does that jump back to the first object on the slide that is currently displayed or jump to the next slide and display the first item?

What I'd like to accomplish is for the first tab item to be the content slide (and follow the sequence set by tab order for content), the second tab item be the prev button, the third tab item to be the next slide button, and the rest of the on screen items to be tabbed to after the next button.

Bruce

Hi Bruce, 

I learn something new every day - it stays on that slide, and just returns the user to the first object on that slide (or in your tab order). So it's only skipping over the player elements and bringing the user back to the slide items. 

As far as the tab order of the additional elements, there isn't a way to change the tab order of those items. The order of tabbing will be as follows: items on the slide in the order defined in the custom tab order, the prev/next buttons, then it'll cycle through the other player elements you've included (menu, resources, etc.). 

The best way to handle this tabbing issue is to add your own custom navigation buttons and disable (remove) the player's navigation. That way they can jump to the next slide before they get to the player navigation.

If storyline would place the navigation on the player first in the order (to the left side before the volume control) we wouldn't have to work around this all the time. It seems that would be a pretty easy change to make.

Hi Terry,

After you've tabbed through the items on the slide, you should then go to the next/prev buttons - and then through the rest of the player elements such as volume, so you should be able to navigate to the next slide prior to seeing the volume button. As I mentioned, I don't use a screen reader often (or ever really!) but that's how it was explained to me that it should work. If you're seeing something different it'll likely be something we want to take a look at in the form of a case with a video of the behavior. You can reach out to our support engineers here.