Using Flash to enter accessibility information for screen readers 517
All objects in Flash documents must have instance names for you to apply accessibility
options to them. You create instance names for objects in the Property inspector. The instance
name is used to refer to the object in ActionScript.
To open the Accessibility panel:
1. Select Window > Other Panels > Accessibility.
2. Select from the available options:
Make Object Accessible instructs Flash Player to pass the accessibility information for an
object to a screen reader. This option is selected by default; when the option is disabled,
accessibility information for the object is not passed to screen readers. You might find it
useful to disable this option as you test content for accessibility because some objects may
be extraneous or decorative and making them accessible could produce confusing results
in the Screen Reader. You can then apply a name manually to the labeled object, and hide
the labeling text by deselecting Make Object Accessible. When Make Object Accessible is
disabled, all other controls on the Accessibility panel are disabled.
Make Child Objects Accessible instructs Flash Player to pass child object information to
the screen reader. This option is for movie clips only and is selected by default. Disabling
this option for a movie clip causes that movie clip to appear as a simple clip in the
accessible object tree, even if the clip contains text, buttons, and other objects. All objects
within the movie clip are then hidden from the object tree. Like the Make Object
Accessible option, this option is useful mainly for hiding extraneous objects from screen
readers.
Auto Label instructs Flash to automatically label objects on the Stage with the text
associated with them. See “Using automatic labeling” on page 518.
Name specifies the object name. Screen readers identify objects by reading these names
aloud. When accessible objects don’t have specified names, a screen reader might read a
generic word, such as Button, which can be confusing.
Description lets you enter a description of the object to the screen reader. This description
is read by the screen reader.
NOTE
If a movie clip is used as a button, meaning that it has a button event handler
assigned to it, such as
onPress or onRelease, the Make Child Objects Accessible
option is ignored because buttons are always treated as simple clips, and their
children are never examined, except in the case of labels.
CAUTION
Do not confuse object names specified in the Accessibility panel with instance
names specified in the Property inspector.
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