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Making hypertext links accessible is crucial for creating web pages and documents that are accessible to everyone, including . This includes users with disabilities who rely on assistive technologies like screen readers. Thankfully, there are some simple guidelines that can be followed to ensure that links are accessible and easy to navigate for all users.
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The use of meaningful text for links is beneficial to all users by making the ability to quickly navigate documents even easier. The text in a link should be describing where the link will go and . This should make sense if read out of context from the remain remaining text. This is important because people who use screen readers can have the software reading only links on webpages. With that in mind, do not use the following phrases as link text due to them not making sense without context:
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Hypertext URLs (like https://www.fredonia.edu/about/offices/information-technology-services) should not be used. Screen readers will only read the URL as individual letters and would be very difficult to understand as well as time consuming. Short URLs can be used but only if the point is to saw what the URL is, like for a website homepage (like www.fredonia.edu). However, this sort of link is unnecessary and is better to have more readable link text like https://www.fredonia.edu/ Fredonia Homepage website.
4. Avoid using the word “link” as part of the link text
Users are usually given information that text has been hyperlinked, so it is counterintuitive to do not add the word “link” to the start or end of the hypertext link. For example, the Fredonia Homepage would be read by most screen readers as “Link Homepage State University of New York at Fredonia (SUNY Fredonia).
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To convey additional information about links to users, it is not recommended to use tooltips, which . Tooltips are pop-up windows that appear when users hover over links. It is best to include all relevant information within the text of the links themselves, as explained in step 1.
Tooltips are unnecessary and may create problems, especially for users with accessibility needs. For instance, people who use screen readers may disable tooltips to limit auditory information, while those . Those who use only the keyboard cannot access tooltip content. Additionally, users who require larger text may not be able to adjust the tooltip size within their browser. Furthermore, title attributes may not be supported on mobile devices such as phones and tablets.
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If you have a document that you know will be likely printed by users then you can use URLs but . But only in parenthesis and they cannot be a link. If this is not done, then screen readers will read it letter by letter.
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