title attribute of the frame and iframe elementsSee Understanding Techniques for WCAG Success Criteria for important information about the usage of these informative techniques and how they relate to the normative WCAG 2.0 success criteria. The Applicability section explains the scope of the technique, and the presence of techniques for a specific technology does not imply that the technology can be used in all situations to create content that meets WCAG 2.0.
HTML and XHTML documents that use frames or iframes
This technique relates to:
Note: This technique must be combined with other techniques to meet SC 2.4.1. See Understanding SC 2.4.1 for details.
The objective of this technique is to demonstrate the use of the title
attribute of the frame or iframe element to describe the contents
of each frame. This provides a label for the frame so users can determine which frame to
enter and explore in detail. It does not label the individual page (frame) or inline
frame (iframe) in the frameset.
Note that the title attribute labels frames, and is different from the
title element which labels documents. Both should be provided, since the
first facilitates navigation among frames and the second clarifies the user's current
location.
The title attribute is not interchangeable with the name
attribute. The title labels the frame for users; the name
labels it for scripting and window targeting. The name is not presented to
the user, only the title is.
In HTML5 the frame element is marked as obsolete. The iframe element remains part of the HTML5 specification.
This example shows how to use the title attribute with
frame to describe the frames containing the navigation bar and the
document.
Example Code:
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<title>A simple frameset document</title>
</head>
<frameset cols="10%, 90%">
<frame src="nav.html" title="Main menu" />
<frame src="doc.html" title="Documents" />
<noframes>
<body>
<a href="lib.html" title="Library link">Select to
go to the electronic library</a>
</body>
</noframes>
</frameset>
</html> This example shows how to use the title attribute with iframe to
describe the contents of an inline frame. The example also includes an alternative
link to the page included by the iframe element for older browsers, which may not
understand the iframeelement.
Example Code:
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<title>A document using iframe</title>
</head>
...
<iframe src="banner-ad.html" id="testiframe"
name="testiframe" title="Advertisement">
<a href="banner-ad.html">Advertisement</a>
</iframe>
...
</html> Resources are for information purposes only, no endorsement implied.
Check each frame and iframe element in the HTML or XHTML source code for the presence of a title attribute.
Check that the title attribute contains text that identifies the frame.
Checks #1 and #2 are true.
If this is a sufficient technique for a success criterion, failing this test procedure does not necessarily mean that the success criterion has not been satisfied in some other way, only that this technique has not been successfully implemented and can not be used to claim conformance.