No repetitive adjacent interactive elements
Supplemental requirement
The page/view does not have adjacent interactive elements that achieve the same outcome
Except when
- That outcome is a form of dismissal.
A common pattern is having a component that includes a linked image and some linked text, where both links go to the same content. Someone using screen reading software can be disoriented from the unnecessary chatter, and a keyboard user has to navigate through more tab stops than should be necessary. Combining adjacent links that go to the same content improves the user experience.
Methods & best practices
- Method: When repetitive interactive elements are used, remove them from the focus and reading order.
- Method: Use a single link instead of multiple links to the same destination.
- Best practice: Combine repetitive links into a single interactive element.
Tests
This section is non-normative.
Procedure
For adjacent interactive elements that achieve the same outcome:
- Check that only one of the elements is focusable and available to assistive technology.
Expected results
- #1 is true.
ACT Rules
This section is non-normative.
This is an Atomic rule to test No Repetitive Adjacent Interactive Elements
This rule checks that a page/view includes no adjacent interactive elements that achieve the same outcome unless the interactive elements are included to dismiss the same element.
- Applicability
- This rule applies to any page/view in which an author has provided a custom keyboard command.
- Expectation
- The custom keyboard command is documented, and programmatically and visually available from any page/view to which it applies.
Examples:
- Passed example 1
- A page/view includes multiple interactive elements and no adjacent elements go to the same destination.
- Passed example 2
- A page/view includes repetitive adjacent interactive elements but only one is in the focus order and is programmatically determinable.
- Failed example 1
- A page/view includes adjacent interactive elements that have the same destination and are in the focus order or are programmatically determinable.
- Inapplicable example 1
- A page/view includes no interactive elements.
- Inapplicable example 2
- A modal dialog includes multiple adjacent interactive elements that dismiss the dialog element.
Tests
This content needs to be written.
Key Terms
- accessibility support set
group of user agents and assistive technologies you test with
The AGWG is considering defining a default set of user agents and assistive technologies that they use when validating guidelines.
Accessibility support sets may vary based on language, region, or situation.
If you are not using the default accessibility set, the conformance report should indicate what set is being used.
- accessibility supported
available and working in the user agents and assistive technology in the accessibility support set
The working group intended to include a default accessibility support set. See Default accessibility support set #277.
- actively available
available for the user to perceive and use
- component
grouping of elements for a distinct function
- conformance scope
A set of Views and/or Pages selected to be part of a conformance claim. Where a View or Page is part of a Process, all the Views or Pages in the process must be included.
How a person or organization selects the set is not defined in WCAG3. There maybe informative guidance on selecting a suitable set in future (similar to WCAG-EM), but regional laws or regulations may provide a methodology.
- content
information, sensory experience and interactions conveyed
- human language
language that is spoken, written, or signed (through visual or tactile means) to communicate with humans
See also sign language.
- interactive element
element that responds to user input and has a distinct programmatically determinable name
In contrast to non-interactive elements. For example, headings or paragraphs.
- non-interactive element
element that does not respond to user input and does not include sub-parts
If a paragraph included a link, the text either side of the link would be considered a static element, but not the paragraph as a whole.
Letters within text do not constitute a “smaller part”.
- page
non-embedded resource obtained from a single URI using HTTP plus any other resources that are used in the rendering or intended to be rendered together
Where a URI is available and represents a unique set of content, that would be the preferred conformance unit.
- platform
software, or collection of layers of software, that lies below the subject software and provides services to the subject software and that allows the subject software to be isolated from the hardware, drivers, and other software below
Platform software both makes it easier for subject software to run on different hardware, and provides the subject software with many services (e.g. functions, utilities, libraries) that make the subject software easier to write, keep updated, and work more uniformly with other subject software.
A particular software component might play the role of a platform in some situations and a client in others. For example a browser is a platform for the content of the page but it also relies on the operating system below it.
The platform is the context in which the conformance scope exists.
- process
series of views or pages associated with user actions, where actions required to complete an activity are performed, often in a certain order, regardless of the technologies used or whether it spans different sites or domains
- programmatically determinable
meaning of the content and all its important attributes can be determined by software functionality that is accessibility supported
- sign language
a language using combinations of movements of the hands and arms, facial expressions, or body positions to convey meaning
- text
sequence of characters that can be programmatically determined, where the sequence is expressing something in human language
- view
content that is actively available in a viewport including that which can be scrolled or panned to, and any additional content that is included by expansion while leaving the rest of the content in the viewport actively available
A modal dialog box would constitute a new view because the other content in the viewport is no longer actively available.
- viewport
object in which the platform presents content
The author has no control of the viewport and almost always has no idea what is presented in a viewport (e.g. what is on screen) because it is provided by the platform. On browsers the hardware platform is isolated from the content.
Content can be presented through one or more viewports. Viewports include windows, frames, loudspeakers, and virtual magnifying glasses. A viewport may contain another viewport. For example, nested frames. Interface components created by the user agent such as prompts, menus, and alerts are not viewports.