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Screen readers and XHTML?

Does JAWS have a problem with the xhtml doctype?

         

Nick_W

8:19 pm on Oct 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Hi everyone,

I'm getting some feedback on a site that will have a very high number of low vision users.

One guy tells me that his JAWS screen reader just says 'blank' when he hits the page?

The site is pure xhtml 1.1 with css layout. What could possibly be wrong?

Thanks

Nick

digitalghost

8:26 pm on Oct 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



If I remember correctly, JAWS had a problem with the /> and with embedded CSS. Gotta link?

Nick_W

8:36 pm on Oct 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Well, it's external css but of course the are />'s ending all of the tags that need it...

Nick

digitalghost

8:55 pm on Oct 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



Heya Nick,

I can only check it using Jaws version 4.5 and it works quite well with that version. Do you know what version your surfer is having difficulties with? Youc can dowload a full working demo here:

[freedomscientific.com...]

It works for 40 minutes per session. I'm checking it with different screen readers now but I don't have access to anything but version 4.5 of the JAWS screen reader.

Nick_W

9:34 pm on Oct 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



From the man himself:


Just as a precaution,, I went once more to your URL, clicking on the link
afresh from your original email to the list, same as I did at first.

This time, the page was accessible to Jaws, which spoke each link and line
of text, and it was very clean and simple.

I don't know why the first visit was an incompatibility or inaccessibility
problem. If I did, I'd also understand why similar glitches happen to me
with certain other sites, such as the New York times online. Sometimes a
page loads and is accessible to Jaws, and occasionally it is just blank,
though I can of course see that there's material there. Refreshing doesn't
help, as that gets you a new download of the exact same version of the page
at that URL, I think. but if you backup and click again on the link, the
next time will work, and the page will be as it should.

Weird...

Nick

dingman

10:46 pm on Oct 1, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



No idea if this would help, but for now I use explicit end tags rather than /> to avoid the occasional confusion that causes. It looks funny to see things in my code like <link attributes></link>, but it works fine.

Anyone have a screenreader for Gnome or KDE? I don't recall Jaws having a Linux version.