Contrib.social

Autocomplete not working with JAWS

Open on Drupal.org →
Created on 27 March 2025, 5 months ago

Problem/Motivation

During recent testing of the core autocomplete function with two different screenreaders (JAWS and NVDA) on Windows, autocomplete was usable with NVDA but broken in JAWS.

Steps to reproduce

  1. Install Drupal core 10.4.5 with the standard profile.
  2. Create at least three administrator user accounts that start with the same sequence of letters.
  3. Log in as one of the administrators, using the JAWS screenreader and Firefox.
  4. Create a new content item.
  5. Expand the Authoring information section.
  6. In the Authored by field, start typing the sequence of letters.
  7. Note the screenreader announces the number of results, and says to use down arrow to select a result.
  8. Arrow down once.
  9. Note the first item is highlighted.
  10. Arrow down again.
  11. Note the screenreader is now on the field help text.
  12. Tab backward to the Authored by field.
  13. Clear the contents of the field.
  14. Type the sequence of characters again.
  15. Arrow down once.
  16. Note the first result is highlighted.
  17. Hit Enter to select the result.
  18. Note the Authored by field still contains just the sequence of characters.

If you repeat the steps with NVDA and Firefox, the autocomplete behaves as expected: you can arrow down and up through all the results, and you can select a result with the Enter key.

Versions used:
Windows 11
Firefox 136.0.2
JAWS 2025.2410.106
NVDA 2024.4.2

Proposed resolution

This may be a JAWS bug.

Remaining tasks

Additional testing. Screenshots and screen recordings.

User interface changes

N/A

Introduced terminology

N/A

API changes

N/A

Data model changes

N/A

Release notes snippet

TBD

🐛 Bug report
Status

Active

Version

10.4 ✨

Component

javascript

Created by

🇺🇸United States cboyden

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  • Accessibility

    It affects the ability of people with disabilities or special needs (such as blindness or color-blindness) to use Drupal.

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Comments & Activities

  • Issue created by @cboyden
  • Comment 5 months ago →
    🇳🇿New Zealand quietone

    Changes are made on on 11.x (our main development branch) first, and are then back ported as needed according to the Core change policies → .

  • Comment 5 months ago →
    🇬🇧United Kingdom the_g_bomb
  • Comment 4 months ago →
    🇨🇦Canada mgifford Ottawa, Ontario

    It might also be a Firefox issue.

    I don't have a Windows device to test with JAWS, but it could be that running Drupal CMS and testing with JAWS would be a good indication.

    This is the fastest way for a JAWS user to get to running Drupal CMS locally to test it:
    https://new.drupal.org/drupal-cms/launcher

    This may not address this issue reported against Drupal Core.

  • Comment 20 days ago →
    🇺🇸United States kentr Durango, CO

    Would this be SC 2.1.1?

  • Comment 16 days ago →
    🇺🇸United States cboyden

    The functionality is usable with the keyboard, so not likely to be 2.1.1. Assuming this is a bug in the implementation and not a bug in JAWS, the most appropriate criterion is probably 4.1.2.

  • Comment 7 days ago →
    🇺🇸United States kentr Durango, CO

    I'm not experienced with JAWS, so just throwing out some thoughts.

    This comment on an old JQuery UI Autocomplete issue indicates that JAWS exits Forms Mode if the input is not updated.

    If you do not update the input field then you will encounter a problem with JAWS where multiple down arrow keypresses simultaneously cause JAWS to pop out of forms mode and stop accepting further user arrow keys as inputs to the input element.

    I noticed that in our case the input does not update when arrowing through the options, so I'm wondering if this is causing JAWS to exit Forms Mode.

    This correlates with this JAWS page on Forms Mode, which describes JAWS automatically exiting with multiple Down Arrow presses. In case it's helpful to diagnose, that page describes a sound that indicates when JAWS exits Forms Mode.

    For a comparison, does the problem happen in the JQuery UI Autocomplete demo?

  • Comment 7 days ago →
    🇺🇸United States kentr Durango, CO

    I see where the update behavior is being cancelled: https://git.drupalcode.org/project/drupal/-/blob/11.x/core/misc/autocomp....

    I can't determine why that code is necessary, though. Maybe for cases where the field can contain multiple items?

    I tested without any focus handler at all, and the input value does change as I arrow down. Attaching a video to illustrate.

    It might be worth testing that configuration in JAWS.

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