How To Make Readers Read Emoticons?

Hi,

There is currently not a plugin to fix this. The problem is that the images generated by the emojis have no accessible name for the screen reader to announce, which is why the screen readers speak nothing other than “graphic” when the user comes across one of these images. This is a known issue and is under discussion by the WordPress Accessibility Team.

Thanks,

Amanda

@alexklman, @arush, What is the markup that’s typically generated? Maybe we can recommend a terse script that adds suitable alt text to it.

If I’m not mistaken, the graphics generated are SVG, so you’ll need to use aria-label, and handle the translation aspects with a PHP function. The JS would contain the aria-label with a value pointing at the PHP function. Let me go create a post with an emoji in it so I can see what the markup looks like and get back to you.

Amanda

Cool, from what I see on these forums (as they’re now using WordPress), the markup is of an image tag pointed to an SVG file. That looks easier, but there doesn’t seem to be anything descriptive that indicates which type of emoji it is.

See this post: Dre Armeda where the source generated prints the emoji directly instead of a link to an image.

Also, here are some resources for making inline SVG accessible.

Using Aria to enhance the accessibility of SVG, and Tips for creating accessible SVG.

Amanda

Thanks for the answers guys, most of what you said went right over my head ??
Ah SVG? are they image files somewhere? Maybe it will help if I found them and renamed them?
I even tried copying the image out of the editor into Ms Word which it works, then placing some alt text on the image in Word, but when I copy it back into the editor, no joy ??

Hi Alex, renaming them isn’t something that is going to work. Instead the code will have to be updated. Maybe it’s best that we just wait until this is implemented from core instead of adding a hotfix.

Ah ok, could I submit this anywhere else or is WordPress aware of this?