Letter spacing in style attributes is not !important
Description
This rule checks that the style
attribute is not used to prevent adjusting letter-spacing
by using !important
, except if it’s at least 0.12 times the font size.
Applicability
This rule applies to any HTML element that is visible and for which the style
attribute declares the letter-spacing CSS property.
Expectation
For each test target, at least one of the following is true:
- not important: the computed value of its letter-spacing property is not important; or
- wide enough: the computed value of its letter-spacing property is at least 0.12 times the computed value of its font-size property; or
- cascade: the cascaded value of its letter-spacing property is not a value declared in its
style
attribute.
Assumptions
-
There is no mechanism available on the page to adjust letter-spacing. If there is such a mechanism, it is possible to fail this rule while Success Criterion 1.4.12 Text Spacing is still satisfied.
-
This rule assumes that WCAG’s meaning for the “Letter spacing style property” is the value of the CSS
letter-spacing
property rather than the actual space between letters. The value of the CSS property is added to whichever spacing already exist (for example, due to kerning). Thus, the actual space between letters can be larger than the value of theletter-spacing
property. If Success Criterion 1.4.12 Text Spacing is concerned by the actual space between letters, then this rule may fail (with theletter-spacing
property being too small) while the Success Criterion is still satisfied (with the actual space being enough). -
This rule assumes that when inter-letters space is changed because of justification, the
letter-spacing
property is not changed. Therefore, whether a text is justified or not doesn’t change the result of this rule. Note that justifying text is a failure of Success Criterion 1.4.8 Visual Presentation.
Accessibility Support
While some assistive technologies are able to set user origin or user agent origin styles, others, such as browser extensions, are only able to set styles with the author origin. Such assistive technologies cannot create styles “winning” the cascade sort over a style
attribute with an important declaration. If accessibility support does not include assistive technologies that override letter-spacing through author origin, this rule should not be used.
Background
When a style is declared in the style
attribute with an important declaration, it “wins” the cascade sort over any other style from author origin, i.e. it cannot be overridden by any of these. On the other hand, if such a style is declared in a style sheet, it can still “lose” the cascade sort to declarations with higher specificity or simply coming from a later style sheet (such as ones injected by assistive technologies). This rule ensures that the element is not in the first case and that the style can be overridden by users, unless it is already at least the minimum required threshold. Important styles that are declared with the user or user agent origin can win the cascade sort over styles with the author origin.
CSS specifications define each declaration as being either important (if it has the !important
annotation) or normal. Given that normal
is also a keyword for this property, and that !important
is wider known that this distinction, this rule rather uses “important”/”not important” to avoid confusion.
Bibliography
- Understanding Success Criterion 1.4.12: Text Spacing
- CSS Text Module Level 3 - Spacing
- CSS Visual formatting model details
Accessibility Requirements Mapping
1.4.12 Text Spacing (Level AA)
- Learn more about 1.4.12 Text Spacing
- Required for conformance to WCAG 2.1 on level AA and higher.
- Outcome mapping:
- Any
failed
outcomes: success criterion is not satisfied - All
passed
outcomes: success criterion needs further testing - An
inapplicable
outcome: success criterion needs further testing
- Any
Input Aspects
The following aspects are required in using this rule.
Test Cases
Passed
Passed Example 1
This p
element has a not important computed letter-spacing
.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.1em">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Passed Example 2
This p
element has a computed letter-spacing
of 0.15 time the font size, which is wide enough.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.15em !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Passed Example 3
This p
element has a computed letter-spacing of 3px
, which is wide enough (the threshold is 3px
).
<style>
p {
font-size: 25px;
}
</style>
<p style="letter-spacing: 3px !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Passed Example 4
This p
element has two declared values for its letter-spacing
property. The latest wins the cascade sort. It has a value of 0.15em
, and is wide enough.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.1em !important; letter-spacing: 0.15em !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Passed Example 5
This p
element has two declared values for its letter-spacing
property. The one which is important wins the cascade sort. It has a value of 0.15em
, and is wide enough.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.15em !important; letter-spacing: 0.1em">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Passed Example 6
The cascaded value of the letter-spacing
property of this p
element is declared in the style sheet, not in the style
attribute (it wins the cascade sort because it is important). Thus, the p
element matches the cascade condition.
<style>
p {
letter-spacing: 0.1em !important;
}
</style>
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.15em">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Passed Example 7
The computed value of the letter-spacing
property of this p
element is not important. The computed value of the letter-spacing
property of this span
element is the inherited value, that is the computed value of its parent and therefore also not important.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.1em">
<span style="letter-spacing: inherit !important;">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</span>
</p>
Passed Example 8
The computed value of the letter-spacing
property of this p
element is not important. The computed value of the letter-spacing
property of this span
element is the inherited value, that is the computed value of its parent and therefore also not important.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.1em">
<span style="letter-spacing: unset !important;">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</span>
</p>
Failed
Failed Example 1
This p
element has a computed letter-spacing
of only 0.1 times the font size, which is below the required minimum.
<p style="letter-spacing: 0.1em !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Failed Example 2
This p
element has a computed letter-spacing
of 2px
which is only 0.1 times the font size (20px
), thus below the required minimum.
<style>
p {
font-size: 20px;
}
</style>
<p style="letter-spacing: 2px !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Failed Example 3
This p
element has a computed letter-spacing
of 0.
<p style="letter-spacing: normal !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Failed Example 4
This p
element has a computed letter-spacing
of 0.
<p style="letter-spacing: initial !important">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Inapplicable
Inapplicable Example 1
There is no HTML element.
<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">
<text y="20" style="letter-spacing: 0.1em">ACT rules</text>
</svg>
Inapplicable Example 2
This p
element is not visible because of display: none
.
<p style="display: none; letter-spacing: 0.1em !important;">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Inapplicable Example 3
This p
element is not visible because it is positioned off-screen.
<p style="position: absolute; top: -999em; letter-spacing: 0.1em !important;">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Inapplicable Example 4
The style
attribute of this p
element does not declare the letter-spacing
property.
<p style="width: 60%">
The toy brought back fond memories of being lost in the rain forest.
</p>
Glossary
Namespaced Element
An element with a specific namespaceURI value from HTML namespaces. For example an “SVG element” is any element with the “SVG namespace”, which is http://www.w3.org/2000/svg
.
Namespaced elements are not limited to elements described in a specification. They also include custom elements. Elements such as a
and title
have a different namespace depending on where they are used. For example a title
in an HTML page usually has the HTML namespace. When used in an svg
element, a title
element has the SVG namespace instead.
Outcome
An outcome is a conclusion that comes from evaluating an ACT Rule on a test subject or one of its constituent test target. An outcome can be one of the three following types:
- Inapplicable: No part of the test subject matches the applicability
- Passed: A test target meets all expectations
- Failed: A test target does not meet all expectations
Note: A rule has one passed
or failed
outcome for every test target. When there are no test targets the rule has one inapplicable
outcome. This means that each test subject will have one or more outcomes.
Note: Implementations using the EARL10-Schema can express the outcome with the outcome property. In addition to passed
, failed
and inapplicable
, EARL 1.0 also defined an incomplete
outcome. While this cannot be the outcome of an ACT Rule when applied in its entirety, it often happens that rules are only partially evaluated. For example, when applicability was automated, but the expectations have to be evaluated manually. Such “interim” results can be expressed with the incomplete
outcome.
Visible
Content perceivable through sight.
Content is considered visible if making it fully transparent would result in a difference in the pixels rendered for any part of the document that is currently within the viewport or can be brought into the viewport via scrolling.
For more details, see examples of visible.
Implementations
This section is not part of the official rule. It is populated dynamically and not accounted for in the change history or the last modified date.
Implementation | Consistency | Complete | Report |
---|---|---|---|
QualWeb | Consistent | Yes | View Report |
SortSite | Consistent | Yes | View Report |
Changelog
This is the first version of this ACT rule.