Lack of screenreader explanation on expanded menu in the table

[AgnieszkaRadecka]

Current behaviour

1. Open Carbon library
2. Find With custom column width table
3. Turn on NVDA tool
4. Move the cursor on the menu Actual results: There is no sound on the expanded menu in the table

Expected behaviour

User should hear about the menu

CodeSandbox or Storybook URL

https://carbon.sage.com/v/106.3.1/index.html?path=/story/flat-table--with-custom-column-width

JIRA Ticket (Sage Only)

SBS-33951

Suggested Solution

No response

Carbon Version

106.3.1

What browsers are you seeing the problem on?

Firefox, Chrome

What Operating System are you seeing the problem on?

Windows

Anything else we should know?

No response

Confidentiality

• [X] I confirm there is no confidential or commercially sensitive information included.

[Parsium]

FE-5173

[nicktitchmarsh]

@AgnieszkaRadecka, we have tested this with NVDA and VoiceOver with no issues. Is there any more information you can give us that will help us replicate the issue?

[AgnieszkaAugust]

There should be also Step 5: Click on kebab menu. Sorry for that I used NVDA tool and for me, it still occurs. The reader doesn't say anything about opening the menu, it read only action inside the menu

After using keyboard: https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/117062821/218091892-94363e6a-4018-4119-a699-02d13bc49800.mp4

[robinzigmond]

hi @AgnieszkaAugust , thanks for coming back on this.

I'm still not sure I see the problem with the action menu. I believe the "button collapsed submenu" is telling you that the button will open a menu when clicked. Then when you open it, you're correct that it reads the first option - this is because we set focus on the first item (if we didn't do that a user using the keyboard would not be able to access the menu items) and the screenreader reads what's focused. Given what was read before I think users should understand sufficiently well what's going on.

I'm no expert here though! @tempertemper do you see anything wrong with how NVDA is behaving on the above video (regarding the popup menu) and if so do you have suggestions for how to improve the experience?

[tempertemper]

Ah it sounds like it's that behaviour that I flagged in the FEET show and tell the other week: the focus goes to the first item in the menu. So because you're clicking the button rather than moving the cursor to it with the keyboard, @AgnieszkaAugust, you never hear the info on the button; it goes directly to the first child.

So it's not broken, it's just not quite right. The behaviour should be changed so that focus remains on the trigger/menu button rather than being taken into the menu. This means they can decide to close it again immediately if they decide they didn't want to open it. To get into the menu the user should move their screen reader cursor forward when the menu is open ("expanded").

[nicktitchmarsh]

I think this https://github.com/Sage/carbon/pull/6627 might actually fix this. As Action Popover, focus is now retained on the opening button rather than automatically focused on the first menu item.