[whatwg] Root WAI-ARIA node for HTML (was: Re: [html5] r3657 - [acgiow] (2) First cut at ARIA integration.)

Sat Aug 22 10:49:21 PDT 2009

On Sat, 22 Aug 2009 17:24:15 +0200, Tab Atkins Jr. <jackalmage at gmail.com>  
wrote:

>>> +    <tr>
>>> +     <td><code>html</code> element
>>> +     <td><code title="attr-aria-role-document">document</code> role
>>> +     <td>Role must be either <code
>>> title="attr-aria-role-document">document</code> or <code
>>> title="attr-aria-role-application">application</code>
>>
>> This should say "the body element" instead.
>>
>>
>>   Root WAI-ARIA node
>>
>>      the <body> or <frameset> in HTML, or the document element in all
>>      other languages.
>>
>> http://www.w3.org/WAI/PF/aria-implementation/#glossary
>
> This does not appear to be correct, though, as AT-significant elements
> may appear in the <head>.  For example, <title> may participate (if
> made visible and given role=heading), and <link> elements similarly
> have a role=link automatically.

I think making elements in <head> visible and give them specific roles is  
not something authors would do, nor do I see any use case for doing so.  
However, making the ARIA root always be the document element seems simpler  
to implement and specify, so maybe the ARIA spec could be changed here?

-- 
Simon Pieters
Opera Software