SCRIPT with equivalent NOSCRIPT |
Section 508 1194.22(a); WAI / WCAG 1.0 checkpoint 1.1
Issue Description Script included in this document has a valid NOSCRIPT element whose content should be equivalent to the script. A NOSCRIPT is valid if the following conditions apply: it exists, it is close to the SCRIPT it refers to, and it is not empty.
How to check Make sure the content of the current NOSCRIPT conveys the same meaning of the associated SCRIPT. The content of NOSCRIPT should let people that do not execute the script achieve the same effects as those that do. In particular, they should be able to access the same content and same interaction opportunities, including links.

NOSCRIPT can contain any HTML tag.

Issue Explanation One way to provide a text equivalent to a SCRIPT element is with NOSCRIPT. The content of this element is rendered when scripts are not enabled. The NOSCRIPT element allows authors to provide alternate content when a script is not executed. The content of a NOSCRIPT element should only be rendered by a script-aware user agent in the following cases:

- The browser is configured not to evaluate scripts
- The browser doesn't support a scripting language invoked by the script

Users of screen readers and speaking browsers would not be able to take advantage of scripts that affect the graphical interface of a web page.

Users not using a mouse or joystick would not be able to take advantage of scripts that open windows, dialogs, and menus.

Note that there are also many other cases where scripts cannot be run by browsers, and there are going to be more and more cases in the future. They include:

- PDAs and cellular phones that are unable to execute scripts
- Browsers in diverse operating systems (such as Windows, MacOS, Linux) unable to execute scripts written in a given language. For example, VBScripts will not run on Netscape on Linux machines
- Users of graphical browsers who disable Javascript for security reasons