IE 8 beta with WAI ARIA SUPPORT!

March 5, 2008Development

This is amazing news in terms of WAI ARIA implementation !

The W3C defines ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications) as a syntax for making dynamic Web content and custom UI accessible. Internet Explorer 8 uses ARIA role, state, and property information to communicate with assistive technologies. Instead of building separate simplified Web pages for accessibility, you can use ARIA to markup your rich Web applications with roles, states, and properties. For example, to match the behavior you create through script, you can define a DIV element as a button, checkbox, or another ARIA role.

Source: Internet Explorer 8 Readiness Toolkit

Rich Schwerdtfeger one the principle architects of the WAI ARIA specifications responded to the news on his blog:

I was elated to find that Microsoft has added support for WAI-ARIA in Internet Explorer 8. Although I am sure support is not complete, this is a statement of commitment by Microsoft and it gives the effort support by over 90 percent of the Web browsers.

 

The TPGi team share Richs’ elation!

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About Steve Faulkner

Steve was the Chief Accessibility Officer at TPGi before he left in October 2023. He joined TPGi in 2006 and was previously a Senior Web Accessibility Consultant at vision australia. Steve is a member of several groups, including the W3C Web Platforms Working Group and the W3C ARIA Working Group. He is an editor of several specifications at the W3C including ARIA in HTML and HTML Accessibility API Mappings 1.0. He also develops and maintains HTML5accessibility and the JAWS bug tracker/standards support.