Recipe 23.2. Making Content Accessible

Problem

You want to make elements within a movie accessible.

Solution

Specify the name and description of each item that you want to be exposed to screen readers. If necessary, convert the item to a movie clip symbol.

Discussion

The Accessibility panel enables you to expose objects to screen readers. It also enables you to name and provide text descriptions for these objects. You can also use it to hide certain objects from screen readers. This recipe discusses how to use the panel, and more broadly, how to expose, hide, name, and describe Flash objects to maximize accessibility to the substance or meaning of the movie.

The following objects can be exposed to screen readers: movie clip instances, button instances, dynamic text, input text, and the movie as a whole. In addition, static text is automatically exposed and cannot be hidden. (If you want to hide static text, convert it to dynamic text and then hide it.)

Not all Flash content is accessible. Vector graphics drawn or imported into Flash and bitmaps imported into Flash are not accessible. Neither are graphic symbols. However, an easy workaround is to convert the content to a movie clip symbol instance and expose that.

All the objects have some or all of the following settings. To select an object to specify its accessibility, click it on the stage. The only exception is the movie as a whole: to specify its accessibility settings, deselect everything on the stage. Once the object is selected, specify the following settings, if applicable, in the Accessibility panel (Window Accessibility).

Make Movie/Object Accessible

Available for all accessible objects. Check to expose the movie or object to screen readers, or uncheck to hide the move or object, as well as all of its children, from screen readers. This setting is checked by default for all objects.

Make Child Objects Accessible

Available only for the movie as a whole and movie clip instances. Check to expose all child objects of the selected movie or movie clip. Uncheck to hide all objects of the selected movie or movie clip. To expose some children and hide others, check Make Child Objects Accessible in the parent, and then uncheck Make Object Accessible for all children you want to hide.

Auto Label

Available only for the movie as a whole. When active, if text appears on or beside an object, Flash uses that text to name the object. For example, a button instance with the word "Home" on it would be called "Home" in a screen reader. When inactive, you must manually name all objects. In addition, any nearby text labels will still be read, which will likely be redundant. If you do not use auto labeling, you should hide nearby text labels from screen readers. However, all static text is automatically exposed; therefore, to hide text labels, first convert them to dynamic text and use the Accessibility panel to hide them.

Name

Available for the movie as a whole, movie clips, buttons, and input (but not dynamic) text. Dynamic text fields are named by their contents. The Name field is intended to hold a short, descriptive nameideally, one under 50 characters (though the field can hold thousands), which should identify the object.

Description

Available for all objects. Use to enter a long text description for the contents.

Filling out the Accessibility panel for each object in the movie is an important first step toward making a movie accessible, but it is only a first step. Later recipes discuss some of the problems and limitations of using the Accessibility panel, as well as other accessibility concerns that go beyond screen readers.

See Also

Recipe 23.3