Tabs Pattern: Missing labeling guidance for the tablist element

[brooksienoodlesoup]

Hi,
This is Brooks Newton writing to suggest an addition to the design pattern definition of 3.21 Tabs in the ARIA Authoring Practices 1.1. Specifically, I think there needs to be guidance on how content authors should label a tabs widget as a whole, so that it is identifiable to assistive technology users. My suggestion would be to advise content authors to supply a label for the element with role="tablist" via aria-labelledby or aria-label markup. The working tabs examples you link to in 3.21 Tabs (automatic and manual activation) employ this tab list naming technique, however the design pattern instructions for WAI-ARIA Roles, States, and Properties doesn't mention providing an accessible name for the element with role="tablist".

Thanks for Your Consideration,
Brooks

[mcking65]

This is resolved in commit 55b113f, which adds the language:

If the tab list has a visible label, the element with role tablist has aria-labelledby set to a value that refers to the labeling element. Otherwise, the tablist element has a label provided by aria-label.