This is Todd at the University of Iowa.
We're just scratching the surface of Drupal here--three or four departments are letting our central web group pilot. We have a couple of really sharp developers and a deep commitment to accessibility. What we're missing is a good understanding of our options for integrating the two. Some things I'd very much like to know--an incomplete list:
How to add uncommon attributes to HTML tags (e.g., scope="col" to a
Setting divs and other regions as ARIA landmarks (aria-live, aria-required)
Scanning ALT text for relevance, or at least scanning to prohibit file names
Setting tab index, accesskey, other keyboard controls
Validating nested heading structure (e.g., ensuring that
<
h2> doesn't move straight to
<
h4>)
...and about a thousand other details. For what it's worth, I'm the web accessibility coordinator here; my job is to work with developers and designers to define best practices for the WCAG guidelines. I'm glad to try to answer more generic accessibility questions, as well.
Comments
Hi Todd,Most of what you are
Hi Todd,
Most of what you are looking to do would require theme overrides. Luckily custom theming is well documented, as are the template files (.tpl.php) and functions you will need to override.
http://api.drupal.org documents all of Drupal Core (make sure to select the correct version)
As an example, you can see examples of theme functions by taking a look at how table markup is themed at http://api.drupal.org/api/drupal/includes--theme.inc/function/theme_table/7 and you can see how images are themed at http://api.drupal.org/api/drupal/includes--theme.inc/function/theme_image/7 . For an example of a theme template file you can see how nodes are themed (by default) at http://api.drupal.org/api/drupal/modules--node--node.tpl.php/7 . Note: Garland and Bartik (Core themes) both override this template file.
Obviously if you are using a module that doesn't make use of these theme functions for its markup your situation will become more complex.
If you notice areas in which you believe that Drupal Core requires accessibility enhancements I encourage you to search for and comment upon an existing open issue, or to create a new issue.
Accessibility Consultant & Web Developer - Zufelt.ca
@ezufelt on Twitter | LinkedIn profile
ARIA roles and headings
To see work currently being done on a theme to add ARIA roles see Add aria landmark roles to Zen.
To see discussion about nesting headings see http://drupal.org/node/514008 . Personally I don't see this being resolved until there is a stable html5 sectioning spec that is implemented by user agents. There is a significant problem in Drupal where the stuff being rendered (block, comment, node, etc.) doesn't know where it might end up on the page. We can do our best to pick logical defaults, but it is difficult to provide options through the UI without making the UI cluttered and confusing for people who are not familiar with markup, semantics, accessibility, etc.
Accessibility Consultant & Web Developer - Zufelt.ca
@ezufelt on Twitter | LinkedIn profile
PSU chiming in. I've been
PSU chiming in. I've been recommending people check out this module as it helps in determining accessibility issues (in drupal 6 at least) -- http://drupal.org/project/accessible_content
There's an option to make it scan the theme layer too and you can also set it to check against the WCAG 2.0 spec. Doesn't get everything but another nice tool for seeing some problems and having it provide possible resolutions.
Ex Uno Plures
http://elmsln.org/
http://btopro.com/
http://drupal.psu.edu/
Funny that you mention this
Funny that you mention this module. I work for Knowbililty, and wanted to try this module out in a site I put together this past weekend. I installed it, created a "libraries" directory under ../sites/all and put the QUAIL files in it as directed, but I cant check (or if I do check and save, it will un-check itself), and it keeps claiming it can't find the QUAIL files (and this also goes on and off). Bottom line, it doesn't work for me.
Any ideas?
BTW, Knowbility INC is a not for profit company, that among other accessibility work does accessibility auditing
Shameless self promo http://www.knowbility.org
That said, I'll gladly be more active with this group and try to help as much as I can to make Drupal as accessible as possible!!!
I have been working on a D7
I have been working on a D7 complete rewrite/fork of accessible_content for those of you using D7.
See: https://drupal.org/node/1071830
See: https://drupal.org/project/quail_api
See: https://drupal.org/project/node_accessibility
In particular, what saved my life is being able to mass validate every node on the site using drush, then look at the produced statistical data.
I am currently writing the node_accessibility_statistics module so that users have a good idea where there problems are.
See: http://drupal.org/sandbox/thekevinday/1305380
See: https://drupal.org/node/1071830#comment-5024984 (the screenshots)
Also, check out kevee's work on D7 accessible_content as well (I am not sure where it is..).
We both seemed to be working in parallel, but completely independent of each other.
I think last conversation talked about possibilities of merging parts of my work into accessible_content.
As far as the scope attribute goes, look out for projects like htmlpurifier that don't know about some of the scope attribute.
See: https://drupal.org/node/1162884
gdruckman, my memory is fuzzy for D6 accessible_content module, but did you download and install the libraries module?
See: https://drupal.org/project/libraries
Yeah, installed the libraries
Yeah, installed the libraries module and still the same... I'll dig more around, hopefully figure it out eventually.
Thanks,
Geri (Gary) Druckman