[Irl-dean] Content display control - button or hyperlink?

[MacIonmhain, Eoin]

Hi Josh,

Thanks very much for your reply, it helps a lot :)

Unfortunately, I don't think the redesign of the form that you suggest
(adding checkboxes for user defined preferences etc), would be feasible in
this case. The form contains so many sections as it is that the development
of a preferences page would actually involve a lot of extra work. 

On top of that, some of the sections of the form themselves are fairly
complicated, so if I was to put together a question for a preferences page to
find out if that section was relevant to a user, the question would probably
only succeed in complicating matters more!

<quote>
for ...example the show/hide may be useful to 
improve the usability for sighted users but I doubt it would be of use 
for non-sighted users but I could be wrong. The advantage, I guess is 
that including the form controls within the <display:none> selector does 
effectively hide the contents from the screen reader user.
</quote>

I agree - it's definitely more of a benefit to sighted users - it looks
slicker, and it keeps the visible length of the form to a minimum. However
for non-sighted users the benefit is that they won't have to tab through
quite as many fields as they would have to if all sections of the form were
visible.

I'm glad to know that a button is better accessibility-wise - I'll be happy
to go with that option so!

Thanks again

Eoin


-----Original Message-----
From: irl-dean-bounces at list.eeng.dcu.ie
[mailto:irl-dean-bounces at list.eeng.dcu.ie]On Behalf Of Joshue O Connor
Sent: 16 July 2008 16:04
To: Irish Design-for-all and e-Accessibility Network
Subject: Re: [Irl-dean] Content display control - button or hyperlink?


*************************************

This e-mail has been received by the Revenue Internet e-mail service. (IP)

*************************************

Hi Eoin,

> I have a form with a load of fieldsets in it. It's pretty long, and a lot
of
> the fieldsets contain optional fields. To make the form appear less
> intimidating and more usable, what I wanted to do is to initally display
only
> the legends of each section/fieldset of the form on screen, and then
provide
> some kind of control that allows users to expand/collapse the content of
the
> fieldset.

That is one approach, another would be to design the form with the most 
common form elements appearing first and depending on whether the 
contents of some fields had anything in them, or even if you 
alternatively added some check boxes for  user defined preferences; then 
only return form fields that are relevant to the users preferences or 
inputted data.

For example, form fields that were not relevant could be left blank by 
the user and when the form was submitted to the server and parsed - the 
server could see that the presence of the blank fields meant some piece 
of data was irrelevant to this particular user and this information 
could be used to determine what form field elements were therefore 
returned to the client side. You could probably use PHP to do this.

This would effectively stagger the inputting of data around the users 
preferences/requirements creating a more simple and usable form.

<snip>
> My question is this - is it better to use a Form control such as a button
to
> do the showing/hiding, as I've done above, or would a hyperlink be better?

Should be doing this at all? For example the show/hide may be useful to 
improve the usability for sighted users but I doubt it would be of use 
for non-sighted users but I could be wrong. The advantage, I guess is 
that including the form controls within the <display:none> selector does 
effectively hide the contents from the screen reader user.

However, I think though some kind of user defined preferences menu at 
the beginning of the form would be best. This would remove the need for 
more complex fieldsets and the need for <display:none> to show or hide 
the form elements as a well marked up form which catered for the defined 
user preferences would mean that all of the form controls that are 
present on the client side are relevant.

> I'd imagine a button is better, since JAWS in forms mode probably wouldn't
> notice a hyperlink - however, lots of sites seem to use hyperlinks to
provide
> similar functionality - for example iGoogle.

Yes, this would be a problem as when in forms mode the user will TAB 
through the form elements and probably skip over the hypertext links. 
The user /could/ drop out of forms mode and then "find" the link - as 
some power users do if they are not sure of all the forms contents - but 
this would not be advisable for 1) basic users or 2) as a way to design 
core functionality of an important form this way.

HTH

Josh

********************************************************************

NOTICE: The information contained in this email and any attachments 
is confidential and may be privileged.  If you are not the intended 
recipient you should not use, disclose, distribute or copy any of 
the content of it or of any attachment; you are requested to notify 
the sender immediately of your receipt of the email and then to 
delete it and any attachments from your system.

NCBI endeavours to ensure that emails and any attachments generated 
by its staff are free from viruses or other contaminants.  However, 
it cannot accept any responsibility for any such which are 
transmitted.  We therefore recommend you scan all attachments.

Please note that the statements and views expressed in this email 
and any attachments are those of the author and do not necessarily 
represent the views of NCBI


********************************************************************



_______________________________________________
Irl-dean mailing list
Irl-dean at list.eeng.dcu.ie
http://list.eeng.dcu.ie/mailman/listinfo/irl-dean


************************

This message has been delivered to the Internet by the Revenue Internet e-mail service (OP)

*************************