How to Create Accessible Frames

Provide meaningful titles for frames which describe the frame's purpose.
Provide meaningful <noframes> content.

A frameset is a Web page which defines a collection of at least two other separate Web pages, which are combined in the same visual space. Visual users usually experience framesets as a cohesive entity. They can scan the contents of multiple pages all at once.

Those using screen readers cannot quickly scan the contents of multiple pages. All of the content is experienced in a linear fashion, one frame at a time. Frames are not inaccessible to modern screen readers, but they can be disorienting.

The screen reader JAWS usually reads all of the frames in a frameset, almost as if they belong to the same page. The user is alerted that a frameset is present, then continues to read all of the pages in the frameset. There is a keyboard shortcut which allows the reader to jump quickly between frames.

Other programs handle frames differently. Home Page Reader does not automatically read the pages in the frameset. Instead, it presents the user with a list of frames within the frameset and allows the user to choose which frame to go to first.

Frame Accessibility

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Frameset//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/frameset.dtd">
<HTML>
<HEAD>
<TITLE>A page that contains frames</TITLE>
</HEAD>
 <FRAMESET cols="15%, 85%">
  <FRAME src="menu.html" name="menu frame">
  <FRAME src="content1.html" name="main content">
 <NOFRAMES>
  <P>This frameset document contains:
   <UL>
    <LI><A href="menu.html">Page navigation</A>
    <LI><A href="content1.html">Main content</A>
   </UL>
  </NOFRAMES>
 </FRAMESET>
</HTML>

One of the most important things you can do to increase the accessibility of frames is to give each frame a title.

When a screen reader user hears a list of frames, it is helpful to know the purpose of each one. Frame titles allow web developers to communicate the purpose of each frame to users of screen readers.

When frame titles are not present, screen readers look for other sources of information, such as the frame's "name" attribute or file name. Sometimes these other sources of information are not very helpful at all. If a frame is given a name or filename of "default3" (or something equally nondescript), there is really no way to know what the frame contains, other than by trial and error.

The best titles for frames are brief and descriptive. Appropriate titles for the frames in a two-frame frameset might be "navigational frame" and "main content."

A page that uses frames should have the correct docement type. The code example above shows a DOCTYPE for a frameset page that uses HTML 4.

NOFRAMES content should always be available if the user cannot or chooses not to view frame content. The noframes content should indicate what the contents of the frames are and provide links to individual frame pages if appropriate.

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