Updating JAWS commentary for ServiceNow Navigation

AM24 · 3 weeks ago

Hello, I am having an issue with JAWS commentary on grayed out navigation arrows in Portal. The arrows that need commentary changed are shown below

This is a description of the issue:

I was wondering if and how this commentary could be changed, as I guess JAWS draws from ServiceNow descriptions. This issues does not occur in the backend requested items table. I wanted to check if I can update this anywhere in ServiceNow. Thank you.

lauri457 · 3 weeks ago

I'm assuming jaws is a screen reader. What attributes does it look at when determining the state. You'd most likely need to edit the widget to have the aria-disabled attribute set as true on the button/anchor when it is disabled.

Is it a customized widget or oob? I would assume that OOB the widgets are accessible.

AM24 · 3 weeks ago

I believe this is OOTB. Where would I go to have the aria-disabled attribute set to true?

lauri457 · 3 weeks ago

On the page in the portal as an admin, right click + ctrl on the widget and select "show widget customizations" from the context menu. Then click the corresponding "i" icon of that widget and check out the html template for that element. You can paste the widget script in here if its custom or if it's oob/cloned you can just tell which one it is and someone will likely be able to help.

Terry_Yeti · 3 weeks ago

I ran your JAWS screen reader navigation question through snowcoder ai. This is an important accessibility topic that affects how visually impaired users interact with ServiceNow.

Here are the key approaches to improve JAWS commentary for ServiceNow navigation:

## 1. Use ARIA Labels on Custom Components

If you're building custom UI components (Service Portal widgets, UI Pages, etc.), ensure proper ARIA attributes are in place:

```html
<button aria-label="Open incident menu" role="button">
<span class="icon-menu"></span>
</button>

<nav aria-label="Main navigation" role="navigation">

</nav>
```

## 2. Update Title Attributes on Navigation Items

For the standard navigation menu items, you can enhance screen reader output by updating the `title` attribute on navigation modules. Go to **System Definition > Modules** and add descriptive titles that JAWS will read aloud.

## 3. Service Portal Accessibility Enhancements

If you're working with Service Portal, update your widget HTML templates to include:

```html
<div role="region" aria-labelledby="section-heading">
<h2 id="section-heading" class="sr-only">Navigation Section</h2>

</div>
```

## 4. Unified Navigation Considerations

For Unified Navigation (Next Experience), ServiceNow has built-in accessibility features. You can customize announcement text through the Banner Announcement configurations, but be careful not to delete core records as they control how announcements appear across the navigation.

## Best Practices

- Test with JAWS in different modes (browse mode vs. forms mode)
- Use semantic HTML elements where possible
- Ensure focus indicators are visible
- Add skip-to-content links for keyboard navigation

Could you share more about which specific navigation area you're trying to improve? Is this for Classic UI, Service Portal, or the Next Experience workspace? That would help me provide more targeted guidance for your use case.

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I used snowcoder ai to generate this. If you need to tweak the requirements, you can run it through their Yeti AI for free.