934872 - Thunderbird subscribe tree - completely broken accessibility

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Thunderbird :: Disability Access, defect)

Description

[James Teh [:Jamie]]

Str:
1. Create an imap or newsgroup account.
2. Select a folder in the account, then File menu -> Subscribe.
3. Tab to the tree of folders.
4. Inspect the accessible for the focus.
Expected: The role should be tree. It should contain children representing the possible folders.
Actual: The role is unknown. It has only one child, which is the column header list.

I know this did work to some extent some time ago, but it's broken in Thunderbird 24. Unfortunately, I have absolutely no idea when it broke.

Comment 1

[James Teh [:Jamie]]

Originally reported by an NVDA user.
Related NVDA issue ticket: http://community.nvda-project.org/ticket/3619

Comment 2

[alexander :surkov (:asurkov)]

Moving into Thunderbird product until we know whether a11y core is guilty

Comment 3

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

(In reply to James Teh [:Jamie] from comment #1)
> Originally reported by an NVDA user.
> Related NVDA issue ticket: http://community.nvda-project.org/ticket/3619

Thanks for filing the bug. Note, please add regressionwindow-wanted when the regression bug has not yet been identified.

Anything in error console?  And has cause been identified and anyone attempted to hunt the regression range?

FWIW, here's all the subscribe bugs created since july 2013 https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/buglist.cgi?list_id=11112682&short_desc=subscri&chfieldto=Now&chfield=[Bug%20creation]&query_format=advanced&chfieldfrom=2013-07-04&short_desc_type=allwordssubstr&product=MailNews%20Core&product=Thunderbird

Comment 4

[James Teh [:Jamie]]

(In reply to Wayne Mery (:wsmwk) from comment #3)
> Anything in error console?
No.
> And has cause been identified and anyone
> attempted to hunt the regression range?
Unfortunately, not yet for both questions.

Comment 5

[James Teh [:Jamie]]

Works in Thunderbird 21.0b1, but broken in 22.0b1.

Comment 6

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

(In reply to James Teh [:Jamie] from comment #5)
> Works in Thunderbird 21.0b1, but broken in 22.0b1.

Is a good start

Comment 7

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

(In reply to James Teh [:Jamie] from comment #5)
> Works in Thunderbird 21.0b1, but broken in 22.0b1.

So this would have broken in the 22.0a1 cycle. Can you determine which build is first bad between
https://archive.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/nightly/2013/02/2013-02-19-03-05-11-comm-central/
and
https://archive.mozilla.org/pub/thunderbird/nightly/2013/04/2013-04-01-03-08-20-comm-central/

Comment 9

[James Teh [:Jamie]]

Unfortunately, I no longer use Thunderbird and don't have the cycles to track this down.

Comment 10

[Alex ARNAUD]

I can reproduce the issue on Debian with Thunderbird 52.6.0.

Best regards.

Comment 11

[Marco Zehe (:MarcoZ)]

Wayne, in TB 60.0b6, this tree now works, but according to the release notes, is a flat list without hierarchy on purpose. It is very likely that any work happening in this area may permanently fix, or re-break, this issue. Where does the work to reinstate a hierarchical tree happen?

Comment 12

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Aceman can better answer comment 11

Comment 13

[:aceman]

The tree is planned to be made hierarchical in bug 1466705.
We are no experts in the accessibility department. If this broke in ~TB22 we have no idea about that and we will surely not fix it automatically.
So any hints on what to do would be appreciated.

Comment 14

[Alex ARNAUD]

(In reply to Marco Zehe (:MarcoZ) [Gone until Jan 7, 2019] from comment #11)
> Wayne, in TB 60.0b6, this tree now works, but according to the release
> notes, is a flat list without hierarchy on purpose. It is very likely that
> any work happening in this area may permanently fix, or re-break, this
> issue. Where does the work to reinstate a hierarchical tree happen?

On my computer with Debian 9 "Stretch", Thunderbird 60 and Orca master (from git) the subscribe list is hierarchical.

What remaining issue do you see? Can we close this issue?

Best regards,
Alex.

Comment 15

[Marco Zehe (:MarcoZ)]

(In reply to Alex ARNAUD from comment #14)
> What remaining issue do you see? Can we close this issue?

None, and yes. Closing WFM.