Forum Discussion
Screen Reader Accessibility for Button States
Hi there,
I'm having some trouble implementing accessibility for my Pick Many activities. Screen readers do not seem to recognize the difference between a Normal state and a Selected state of a button
I have a multiple choice question where the user can select more than one answer. I've made Normal state alt texts (Option 1, Option 2, Option 3, Option 4) and I've made Selected state alt texts (Option 1 Selected, Option 2 Selected, Option 3 Selected, Option 4 Selected). This way, a visually impaired user can know which answers he/she has already chosen before selecting the Next/Submit button.
It doesn't work though and the screen reader just reads the normal alt texts. Is there a solution around this? Thanks!
Hi, all!
I have some great news to share! We just released a new version of Storyline 360 (Update 103), which included a fix for the issue where screen readers didn't always announce the visited state of buttons or shapes.
To take advantage of this update, simply launch the Articulate 360 desktop app on your computer and click the Update button next to Storyline 360. You'll find step-by-step instructions here.
Please let us know if you have any questions by posting here or reaching out to our Support Engineers directly. We'll be happy to help!
90 Replies
Thanks Birgit - that does make sense, and I saw the same thing while testing out your file too.
I tried recreating the issue on a new file, attached for you here. You'll see I set up my radio buttons a bit differently to test a few things, but they both have the Alt text enabled. The CC on button is animating in similar to yours, and the CC off button also had it's "Radio button" title in the timeline renamed to match the alt text.
I uploaded this to Tempshare for some quick testing, and viewed in Chrome HTML5 with Jaws 18 - and both of them noted the correct alt text when selected and when not selected.
Can you take a look at my example and let me know how it behaves for you? I'd like to narrow down what could be causing it...I didn't add in your triggers as I don't think that should have an impact but let me know if you spot something else!
Hello, We had 30+ training modules in Rise, and I am in the process of learning Storyline to transfer them to Storyline for Accessibility purposes-
I am trying to make sure I am up to speed on everything in Storyline that is Accessible/508 Compliant, and where there are bugs/issues that I should be aware of on the front end until we are able to get a screen reader to check our modules as we go-
Has this issue in this thread regarding Ria's question been resolved? Just wondering as I am making a list and I didn't see a final comment, but I wasn't sure if that was typical or not and I just wanted to check, thank you!
Hi there, Arin!
I recently responded to your post in this other discussion, so be sure to check out the information I shared there!
This discussion is about a different bug. When you select an answer on a quiz question slide in Storyline, JAWS will say, "To change the selection, press Up or Down Arrow." However, this doesn't work. You actually have to press the Tab key to change the selection.
This bug has been a tough one for us to nail down, but we're still looking into it. You're in the right place to stay up-to-date on our progress!
Has there been any update concerning screen readers discerning between the alt text on different states of buttons?
Hi Meagan,
Our team is still looking at the issue where JAWS doesn't read the alt text from Tab Order for objects with multiple states.
In the meantime, there are a few workarounds you could use:
- Manually change the alternate text of the states. (Edit state > Righ click object for each state > Size and position > Accessibility)
- Modify the alt text in the Tab Oder before adding a state to the object.
We'll let you know here as soon as we have additional updates!
If it is of any help, I've done many revisions with existing Storyline files over the past few months. I've noticed that if the object used customized states, that new state's alt text is read correctly. If it is a "native" state from Storyline, like "Selected" or "Visited", JAWS will ignore that state's alt text, and instead read what is found on the "Normal" state alt text. Due to interacting with the course to reveal information, I like to have alt text that indicates the user interacted with an object.
Ashley, are you suggesting to add alt text in the Tab Order window first, instead of "right-click"/Accessibility on each shape? Would that affect the alt text I readback for "Selected" or "Visited" states?
If you would like to see source files, I may be able to supply something.
Hi Ashley,
We have tried the work arounds stated above and neither work with JAWS, NVDA or VoiceOver. The alternate states do not read, even when additional alt text is added. The alt text on a state does not show in the tab order, either. Adding an additional shape on top and using a trigger/variable to set it (say, as a visited state) would work, but would also make tabbing through with JAWS (or any screen reader), a pain because there is no way to prevent the initial state from being read. Just wanted to share what we are experiencing.
Thanks so much for sharing your experience, Ashley. I'll definitely add these details to our report. As soon as we have an update on this bug, we'll pass the information along to you!
Hello Jason and welcome to E-Learning Heroes :)
Thank you so much for popping in to share your related findings. I'm adding them to the report as we continue investigating.
As for Ashley's suggestions, those were possible workarounds identified by our team. If you'd rather use the built-in states, you could certainly try it out, but it sounds like you're onto a good solution that's working well for you.
Hi all, checking in to see if this bug has been addressed yet?
Hi, Cristina. Thanks for checking in!
While I don't have an update on this problem just yet, we promise to keep this discussion updated as soon as new information is available.
Thanks for bearing with us, and let us know if we can be of any other help!
