30 minutes
In this lab, you will learn how to:
A basic working knowledge of Flash.
Flash MX and higher only.
,
3 KB)
,4
KB)
,
1 KB)
,
36 KB)One of the basic techniques that all Flash designers know is how to manipulate images and include them in their own presentations. Images usually dominate what the user sees, but also present accessibility issues. With the recent releases of Flash, you can help individuals who rely on screen readers. This lab will walk you through the steps involved and give you a glimpse at the accessibility panel. The lab is purposely kept simple, and the techniques you learn here will be used in other labs.
Providing text equivalents is one of the most effective ways to open up your presentation to individuals with vision disabilities. The text equivalents will be exposed to a screen reader, which then reads your text to the user.
You should now have something that looks like Image 1:
Review how a screen reader would read the Flash presentation in its current status:
,
522 KB).
,
1 KB).As a designer, you now have to make a decision. Does the hammer image convey information? Since it is the logo of the company, then you should have a description of the hammer hitting a nail. The smiley face is less important, so you could hide it from the screen reader.
There are two elements that you can expose to the screen reader that benefit the user:
Begin by making the image accessible.
Image 2: Convert to Movie Clip to make image accessible.
Image 3: "Little man" icon in Convert to Symbol Dialog
Box
Note: It is important to include the punctuation in the alternative text. The comma denotes a brief pause to the screen reader. Not having the punctuation can cause the screen reader to run the sentences together.
You have now made a single image more accessible by supplying a text
equivalent for it. Make the movie even more accessible by doing the same
for the entire presentation. It follows the same format. To do this, you
will need to get the accessibility panel for the stage.
There are two other short topics that need to be addressed. The first is the 'Make Child Objects Accessible' checkbox. This checkbox works with elements that contain other elements, and determines whether or not those inner elements are read by the screen reader. For example, the movie you just created has a text equivalent, but also contains inner elements that you wish to have read. If you had deselected the 'Make Child Objects Accessible' checkbox, the screen reader would have never read the hammer logo, nor the text of the Happy Hammer Company. While in this case it probably will not matter, you can imagine that normally there would be much more text in the presentation.
,
682 KB),
1 KB).Whenever a designer works with user interface elements, such as buttons and textfields, they are usually associated with some kind of text, such as the label on a button. Flash will, by default, try to associate labels that are relatively close to buttons and textfields to those buttons and textfields. In other words, the screen reader will assume that a label appearing close to a button belongs to that button. Sometimes this is a nice feature; but it has the restriction of only associating one word for the entire label! If you want multiple words to be read for a user interface component, you will need to add an alternative text as described in this tutorial. The problem now is that you may have two pieces of text that need to be read for only one component. To eliminate this, turn off auto-labeling, such that it only reads the explicit alternative text you typed in, and not the label that is closest to it.
Your screen reader is not capable of reading your Flash presentation from within Flash.
Optionally, you can press Ctrl-F12. This will generate a temporary file that your screen reader can read.
In this lab, you were taught:
The next lab will present a lab on the speaking order of elements in Flash.
College of Architecture (COA)
Fax: 404-894-9320
Phone: 404-894-4960 (v/tty)
User Agreement
Flash
Text Equivalents
Image 1
Previous Page
