JavaScript Pop-Up Dialog Not Being Read by Web Accessibility Screen Reader

Question

I have a project requirement in which the web page I am building in question needs to be read by the JAWS screen reading software, but the client only has access to JAWS 11 as their latest version.

We currently have JavaScript-based pop-up dialogs for many of the forms on the web and right now a big problem is that the JAWS 11 software cannot read the below pop-up text. What is wrong with the pop-up dialog below (in HTML)?

<div class="modal fade" id="EditContentModal" tabindex="-1" role="dialog" aria-labelledby="editContentDialogTitle" 
aria-hidden="true" title="Edit Content Pop-up Dialog Window" aria-describedby="editContentDialogTitle">
    <div class="modal-dialog"  >
        <div class="modal-content">
            <div class="modal-header">
                <button type="button" class="close" data-dismiss="modal" aria-label="Close" value="Close"><span aria-hidden="true">&times;</span></button>
                <h4 class="modal-title" id="editContentDialogTitle">Edit: Content ID <span id="lblContentid"></span></h4>
            </div>

            <div class="modal-body">
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_Contentnumber">Content Number</label>
                            <input type="text" class="form-control" max-length="20" id="edit_Contentnumber" />
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_Educationalinsitution">Educational Insitution</label>
                            <input type="text" class="form-control" max-length="100" id="edit_Educationalinsitution" />
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                 <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_TotalAmountforRecovery">Total Amount Available for Recovery</label>
                            <input type="text" class="money form-control" max-length="10" id="edit_TotalAmountforRecovery" />
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_source">Source</label>
                            <select id="edit_source" class="form-control"></select>
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                         <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_indemletterdate">Indemnification Letter Date</label>
                            <input type="text" class="form-control datepicker" id="edit_indemletterdate" />
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_Contentreceiveddate">Content Received Date</label>
                            <input type="text" class="form-control datepicker" id="edit_Contentreceiveddate" />
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_site">Site</label>
                            <select id="edit_site" class="form-control">
                            </select>
                            @*<input type="text" class="form-control" max-length="10" id="edit_site" />*@
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>
                <div class='row'>
                    <div class='col-md-8'>
                        <div class='form-group'>
                            <label for="edit_status">Status</label>
                            <select id="edit_status" class="form-control">
                            </select>
                        </div>
                    </div>
                </div>

                <input type="hidden" id="edit_Contentid" />
                <img id="displayBlockUI" alt="Spinner" src="~/Images/loader2.gif" width="32" height="32" style="display:none" />
            </div>
            <div class="modal-footer">
                <button type="button" id="cancel_edit" class="btn btn-default" data-dismiss="modal" value="Close">Close</button>
                <button type="button" id="save_edit" class="btn btn-primary" value="Save">Save</button>
            </div>
        </div>
    </div>
</div>

Answer 1

Setting the main content to aria-hidden='true' tells the screen reader to stop reading the content there.

Try using aria-hidden='false'

Answer 2

How are you opening the modal? Because with a tabindex of -1 on the wrapper div, you will only be able to send the screenreader and keyboard focus to the modal via JavaScript. In that case it's best to make moving the focus part of the script which opens the modal.

On the other hand, if it's opened via a link, you can just remove that tabindex attribute altogether and put the id of the wrapper div in the link href, eg <a href=#EditContentModal>

Either way, remember to send focus back to where it started when the modal is closed.

Edited to clarify: the tabindex="-1" attribute on your wrapper div is preventing keyboard access. Remove it. See MDN's tabindex reference : a negative value means that the element should be focusable, but should not be reachable via sequential keyboard navigation.