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I have a couple interactive elements and old flash videos that allow users to click. I want to know if flash is considered accessible and I don't need to do anything to them?

if it's not accessible, is it best practice to add: 

aria-hidden="true"

to the div that contains the flash so the screen reader skips it?

Thanks in advance

Gcamara14
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  • Your question makes no sense. I suggest you make an example page demonstrating the problem. Give us the link, and tell us what is expected result vs current result. – VC.One Jun 28 '17 at 12:51
  • It does make sense, I want to know if it's considered usable as flash is starting to get fazed out. It's not even supported on mobile... How is that accessible? Just trying to get extra info. – Gcamara14 Jun 28 '17 at 16:51
  • Flash can be made accessible, but it all depends on what it's doing. Flash is known to cause focus traps, so once they get into the object, they can't get out. Aria-hidden can help some, but most likely users either figured out around it or don't use the site. Id recommend moving the videos somewhere accessible, vs trying to fix. I am almost 100% sure you'd have to write the player or whatever it is, from scratch to truly fix it – Ryan B Jul 03 '17 at 08:06

2 Answers2

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Short answer: Probably not. While there are many ways you can make your flash elements more accessible, there are far too many unknowns to be able to say if your usage of them would be accessible.

Longer answer:

Flash presents many challenges to a user - not just a screen reader user. As web content, an 'accessible' flash element needs to meet the required guidelines to be accessible - which is usually defined by WCAG 2.0. These criteria can include meeting contrast ratios, animation restrictions, access to controls and alternative content (amongst others). Simply hiding a flash element from a screen reader could still leave issues in other areas of the WCAG.

Keep in mind that many devices stopped supporting flash quite some time ago and support across platforms on modern devices and assistive technology is likely shaky at best. While I don't have statistics to back this up, there is a good chance that a large portion of users will not be able to access the flash content at all - regardless of disability - since flash is no longer supported on many devices.

If the flash content is used for any non-decorational purposes on the page, it would be wise to include that content in some format other than flash to allow more people to use your page. This technique is also permitted for accessible content (see: Conforming Alternate Version definition)

Skerrvy
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    Also, this is an older answer, but it can provide more insight into some challenges of using flash with assistive technologies: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/269686/flash-and-accessibility?rq=1 – Skerrvy Jun 28 '17 at 13:37
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Flash player has integrated support for screen access technologies.

But you have to proactively make your flash object accessible.

WebAIM has a doc about Creating Accessible Flash Content

Adam
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