California Department of Rehabilitation - Web Accessibility Resources

Section 508, 1194.22(e)

Quick Links:

“Provide redundant text links for each active region of a server-side image map.”

WCAG 1.0 Checkpoint: 1.2

Explanation

When a server-side image map must be used, content developers should provide an alternative list of image map choices. There are two techniques:

Include the alternative links within the body of an OBJECT element.
If IMG is used to insert the image, provide an alternative list of links after it and indicate the existence and location of the alternative list (e.g., via the "alt" attribute).

In other words, place hyperlinks that are accessible to people who cannot use a mouse by providing an alternative list of image map links and indicate the existence and location of the alternative list (e.g., via the "alt" attribute).

Before:

			<a href="http://www.example.com/cgi-bin/imagemap/my-map">
			<img src="welcome.gif" alt="Welcome!" ismap />
			</a>
			

After:

			<a href="http://www.example.com/cgi-bin/imagemap/my-map">
			<img src="welcome.gif" alt="Welcome! (Text links follow)" ismap />
			</a>
			
			[<a href="reference.html">Reference</a>]
			
			[<a href="media.html">Audio Visual Lab</a>]

Reference