How accessible are links?
How accessible are links?
By Frank van Eldijk-Smeding
6 min read
Links are one of the main basic elements that you’ll find on any website. Yet, a lot of them are not as accessible as we would like.
- Authors
- Name
- Frank van Eldijk-Smeding
- linkedinFrank van Eldijk-Smeding
- twitter@frank_vaneldijk
- Github
- githubbeingfrankly
- Website
- websiteBlog
In this short article I'll focus on screen readers and voice recognition, and how they deal with links. I'll not cover every possible problem that could happen. I'm going to reserve that for a different article which I'll publish soon.
Before we continue, I want to avoid any confusion upfront. When I’m referring about links I assume that they’re used with the semantic HTML element: <a>
.
Using a different HTML element — like a <div>
which is styled to look like a link — might not be set up right. And this could cause a multitude of problems. If you want to read more about this this, I've written an article on why we should prefer semantic HTML.
How assistive technologies understand a web page
This is possible through the use of many accessibility API’s. The platform that the browser runs on uses one of those API’s to read the content of a web page.
How this process actually works in the background would be too much for this article. If you want to learn the details behind this, I recommend you to read Web Accessibility with Accessibility API. It’s a great article written by Léonie Watson.
The part that’s important for us to know is that those API's expose certain information. This happens for every object in the DOM. And this information is crucial for assistive technologies to understand what each object means.
There are two pieces of information I want to focus on, and those are the role
and the name
. The role
of the DOM object exposes its purpose. It could be a link, a button or something else like an image. The name
of the DOM object gives its identity. It’s also referred as the Accessible Name.
So, let’s use the example above to quickly recap what we’ve learned.
- The
<main>
element will have therole
of “main”. Thename
is empty because we didn’t supply one. - Each
<p>
element will have therole
of “paragraph”. Again thename
is empty since we didn’t supply one. - Every
<a>
element will have therole
of “link”. Thename
will be “Read more”. This happens because thename
— or Accessible Name — is determined from a list of possible options. And in this case it was the value inside the<a>
element that’s used for the Accessible Name.
I’ve picked this example on purpose because it’s quite common to see a list of cards. Each card having a title, some text and at the bottom a “Read more” link.
So, let’s see which problems could happen for screen readers & voice recognition if we leave the example above untouched.
Potential barriers for screen readers & voice recognition
When a sighted user sees a “Read more” link that’s near other elements, they’re usually able to group them together. The context behind the “Read more” link is then related to the text and the title. It becomes clear what to expect when they press the link. This happens because of the Law of Proximity and/or the Law of Common Region, depending on how the elements are visually styled.
Yet, people who rely on screen readers are usually not able to scan the page, and group elements based on visual proximity. So, in this case the “Read more” link doesn’t have any meaning to them.
People who use voice recognition might be able to group elements together, visually that is. However, they’ll experience a different barrier.
To interact with an element, you could say “Click”, followed by the Accessible Name of the element. This is a command from Voice Control on MacOS — . This will then press the element that matches the Accessible Name.
In our example it would be “Click, Read more”. But, this will just give each “Read more” link a number on screen. And in order to continue, you’ll have to say “Click” again followed by the number you actually meant to interact with.
This happens because all three “Read more” links share the same Accessible Name. WhichIn order to improve this experience, we need to give each link a unique Accessible Name.
So, for both our screen reader and voice recognition users, this example leads to a poor user experience. What could we do to solve this and create a more frictionless user experience?
The solution (well, one of many)
There are a couple options available to us. But, let’s focus on one solution for now to keep this article brief. I’ll write an in-depth article on a lot more barriers (and their solutions) soon.
Let’s remove the “Read more” link first, because it’s giving everybody a hard time. And let’s implement a new link, one that wraps the entire card element. This doesn’t solve the problem for our users yet, it requires a little bit of tweaking.
When we’re wrapping an element inside a link, the Accessible Name is derived from all the elements inside of it. And in this case, it would be the title and the paragraph. Not a horrible outcome, but we can do better.
To give our new links a more accurate Accessible Name, we have to use either the aria-label
or the aria-labelledby
attributes. I prefer the aria-label
myself, because in most cases I find it easier to work with. But attributes serve the same purpose. To give an Accessible Name — or in this case, override — to an element.
Let’s check it out!
After we’ve implemented our changes, a screen reader user is able to make sense of each link. We’ve went from “Read more” to the title of the article, a context which makes more sense to our users.
The barrier that voice recognition users experienced is also gone. Since all three links have a unique Accessible Name, it’s possible to use the command “Click” followed by the name of the title.
If you’ve liked this piece of content and you want to get regular updates on other things I write about then follow me on Twitter. And if you have any comments or questions then don’t hesitate to contact me
Upcoming events
Coven of Wisdom - Herentals - Winter `24 edition
Worstelen jij en je team met automated testing en performance? Kom naar onze meetup waar ervaren sprekers hun inzichten en ervaringen delen over het bouwen van robuuste en efficiënte applicaties. Schrijf je in voor een avond vol kennis, heerlijk eten en een mix van creativiteit en technologie! 🚀 18:00 – 🚪 Deuren open 18:15 – 🍕 Food & drinks 19:00 – 📢 Talk 1 20:00 – 🍹 Kleine pauze 20:15 – 📢 Talk 2 21:00 – 🙋♀️ Drinks 22:00 – 🍻 Tot de volgende keer? Tijdens deze meetup gaan we dieper in op automated testing en performance. Onze sprekers delen heel wat praktische inzichten en ervaringen. Ze vertellen je hoe je effectieve geautomatiseerde tests kunt schrijven en onderhouden, en hoe je de prestaties van je applicatie kunt optimaliseren. Houd onze updates in de gaten voor meer informatie over de sprekers en hun specifieke onderwerpen. Over iO Wij zijn iO: een groeiend team van experts die end-to-end-diensten aanbieden voor communicatie en digitale transformatie. We denken groot en werken lokaal. Aan strategie, creatie, content, marketing en technologie. In nauwe samenwerking met onze klanten om hun merken te versterken, hun digitale systemen te verbeteren en hun toekomstbestendige groei veilig te stellen. We helpen klanten niet alleen hun zakelijke doelen te bereiken. Samen verkennen en benutten we de eindeloze mogelijkheden die markten in constante verandering bieden. De springplank voor die visie is talent. Onze campus is onze broedplaats voor innovatie, die een omgeving creëert die talent de ruimte en stimulans geeft die het nodig heeft om te ontkiemen, te ontwikkelen en te floreren. Want werken aan de infinite opportunities van morgen, dat doen we vandaag.
| Coven of Wisdom Herentals
Go to page for Coven of Wisdom - Herentals - Winter `24 editionMastering Event-Driven Design
PLEASE RSVP SO THAT WE KNOW HOW MUCH FOOD WE WILL NEED Are you and your team struggling with event-driven microservices? Join us for a meetup with Mehmet Akif Tütüncü, a senior software engineer, who has given multiple great talks so far and Allard Buijze founder of CTO and founder of AxonIQ, who built the fundaments of the Axon Framework. RSVP for an evening of learning, delicious food, and the fusion of creativity and tech! 🚀 18:00 – 🚪 Doors open to the public 18:15 – 🍕 Let’s eat 19:00 – 📢 Getting Your Axe On Event Sourcing with Axon Framework 20:00 – 🍹 Small break 20:15 – 📢 Event-Driven Microservices - Beyond the Fairy Tale 21:00 – 🙋♀️ drinks 22:00 – 🍻 See you next time? Details: Getting Your Axe On - Event Sourcing with Axon Framework In this presentation, we will explore the basics of event-driven architecture using Axon Framework. We'll start by explaining key concepts such as Event Sourcing and Command Query Responsibility Segregation (CQRS), and how they can improve the scalability and maintainability of modern applications. You will learn what Axon Framework is, how it simplifies implementing these patterns, and see hands-on examples of setting up a project with Axon Framework and Spring Boot. Whether you are new to these concepts or looking to understand them more, this session will provide practical insights and tools to help you build resilient and efficient applications. Event-Driven Microservices - Beyond the Fairy Tale Our applications need to be faster, better, bigger, smarter, and more enjoyable to meet our demanding end-users needs. In recent years, the way we build, run, and operate our software has changed significantly. We use scalable platforms to deploy and manage our applications. Instead of big monolithic deployment applications, we now deploy small, functionally consistent components as microservices. Problem. Solved. Right? Unfortunately, for most of us, microservices, and especially their event-driven variants, do not deliver on the beautiful, fairy-tale-like promises that surround them.In this session, Allard will share a different take on microservices. We will see that not much has changed in how we build software, which is why so many “microservices projects” fail nowadays. What lessons can we learn from concepts like DDD, CQRS, and Event Sourcing to help manage the complexity of our systems? He will also show how message-driven communication allows us to focus on finding the boundaries of functionally cohesive components, which we can evolve into microservices should the need arise.
| Coven of Wisdom - Utrecht
Go to page for Mastering Event-Driven DesignThe Leadership Meetup
PLEASE RSVP SO THAT WE KNOW HOW MUCH FOOD WE WILL NEED What distinguishes a software developer from a software team lead? As a team leader, you are responsible for people, their performance, and motivation. Your output is the output of your team. Whether you are a front-end or back-end developer, or any other discipline that wants to grow into the role of a tech lead, RSVP for an evening of learning, delicious food, and the fusion of leadership and tech! 🚀 18:00 – 🚪 Doors open to the public 18:15 – 🍕 Let’s eat 19:00 – 📢 First round of Talks 19:45 – 🍹 Small break 20:00 – 📢 Second round of Talks 20:45 – 🙋♀️ drinks 21:00 – 🍻 See you next time? First Round of Talks: Pixel Perfect and Perfectly Insane: About That Time My Brain Just Switched Off Remy Parzinski, Design System Lead at Logius Learn from Remy how you can care for yourself because we all need to. Second Round of Talks: Becoming a LeadDev at your client; How to Fail at Large (or How to Do Slightly Better) Arno Koehler Engineering Manager @ iO What are the things that will help you become a lead engineer? Building Team Culture (Tales of trust and positivity) Michel Blankenstein Engineering Manager @ iO & Head of Technology @ Zorggenoot How do you create a culture at your company or team? RSVP now to secure your spot, and let's explore the fascinating world of design systems together!
| Coven of Wisdom - Amsterdam
Go to page for The Leadership Meetup