ARIA is technology built into the code of a website which communicates specific information for screen reader users. ARIA landmarks and labels identify elements such as menus, forms and search boxes. ARIA live regions identify parts of a webpage that change, such as a rolling banner. These features, which are invisible to anyone not using a screen reader, can make all the difference for a blind user.
The certification of ARIA as a standard by the World Wide Web Consortium (the international web standards body) means that ARIA will become more common, and those learning to creating web content will learn to include it by default.
According to Michael Curran, co-founder of NV Access (the company behind the free screen reader NVDA), the draft version of ARIA used prior to its becoming standard has been widely embraced by many website owners.
“For several years now, ARIA has been providing the means to make complex web applications accessible,” Curran said. “This includes toolbars, menus, dialogs, embedded applications, sliders and so forth. Live regions (dynamic content that should be spoken when changed) are also important in this day and age, and the introduction of landmarks to better break down a page structurally is also great.”
Curran said NV Access had played a major role in developing the ARIA standard through providing consulting and opinion on ARIA and through providing prototypes of its screen reader to ensure compatibility with ARIA. The NVDA screen reader also already largely supports the ARIA standard.
Curran said users of screen reader software should expect that their software providers will add more support for ARIA in each new release, meaning users may need to upgrade or update more frequently.
“Obviously, if a screen reader does not support ARIA, it will get left behind, and eventually very well may stop its users from accessing many modern websites. Not only because new controls or paradigms may now rely on ARIA, but also because many of the older web authoring tricks and hacks for screen readers may no longer be used, now that ARIA has proven to be a much cleaner solution, not to mention a standard.”
ARIA is supported by all the latest versions of major screen readers and web browsers. Screen reader users should update their software to get the greatest benefits.
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