Use live region in error text input decorator for Android by ash2moon · Pull Request #165531 · flutter/flutter

ash2moon · 2025-03-20T00:00:29Z

Resolves partly #165510

Context: This issue originates from #99715, where it was reported that liveRegion alone was insufficient for announcing form validation errors. While liveRegion announces the first error encountered, subsequent submissions with the same error message on Android would not trigger a re-announcement.

Original Solution: Pull request #123373 addressed this by implementing the announce event to ensure error messages were consistently announced, even for repeated submissions.

Native Android Behavior (Jetpack Compose): In native Android development using Jetpack Compose, setting the isError property of a TextField to true triggers Talkback to announce "Error invalid input." This announcement occurs only on the initial change to the error state. Subsequent errors, even if the isError property remains true, are not re-announced. This behavior closely mirrors the functionality of liveRegion, with the key difference being that liveRegion also announces the specific error text, in addition to the general error state. Testing in a native Jetpack Compose application confirms this behavior and provides a valuable comparison point against the current Flutter form example.

Suggested Action: Fork the behavior in #123373. Reinstate the use of liveRegion for error announcements within widgets/Form for Android and keep other platforms the same.

Pre-launch Checklist

I read the Contributor Guide and followed the process outlined there for submitting PRs.
I read the Tree Hygiene wiki page, which explains my responsibilities.
I read and followed the Flutter Style Guide, including Features we expect every widget to implement.
I signed the CLA.
I listed at least one issue that this PR fixes in the description above.
I updated/added relevant documentation (doc comments with ///).
I added new tests to check the change I am making, or this PR is test-exempt.
I followed the breaking change policy and added Data Driven Fixes where supported.
All existing and new tests are passing.

If you need help, consider asking for advice on the #hackers-new channel on Discord.

hannah-hyj · 2025-03-20T17:20:34Z

The original issue #99715 is not on android but on macOS with voiceover, can you test if the live region works there?

ash2moon · 2025-03-20T21:26:52Z

The original issue #99715 is not on android but on macOS with voiceover, can you test if the live region works there?

Looks like macos has issues with liveregion and not speaking this text. Does macos not support liveregion at all?

ash2moon · 2025-03-21T20:12:08Z

The original issue #99715 is not on android but on macOS with voiceover, can you test if the live region works there?

I added back the original code for the other platforms and turned on liveRegion and removed the deprecated announce call for Android.

hannah-hyj · 2025-03-24T20:47:06Z

    }

-    if (errorMessage.isNotEmpty) {
+    if (errorMessage.isNotEmpty && defaultTargetPlatform != TargetPlatform.android) {


can you add a comment here that android is use live region for error message and others are using announcement?

Can you instead refactor this into a method named "shouldPreferLiveRegionOverAnnounce"

I ended up choosing to go with isAnnounceSupported because live region would probably not be the best replacement all the time. The PR for that is in #166099

@reidbaker this PR can be reviewed now since the parent PR was merged

hannah-hyj

LGTM with a nit comment

reidbaker

Please also update the pr description with the current state of the pr. (forked behavior instead of a pure revert)

@ash2moon see https://docs.flutter.dev/ui/adaptive-responsive/capabilities for a longer set of documenation on my thoughts behind why we should abstract the logic around platform checking to a method.

reidbaker · 2025-03-25T14:05:41Z

    }

-    if (errorMessage.isNotEmpty) {
+    if (errorMessage.isNotEmpty && defaultTargetPlatform != TargetPlatform.android) {


Can you instead refactor this into a method named "shouldPreferLiveRegionOverAnnounce"

ash2moon · 2025-03-27T22:48:43Z

Please also update the pr description with the current state of the pr. (forked behavior instead of a pure revert)

@ash2moon see https://docs.flutter.dev/ui/adaptive-responsive/capabilities for a longer set of documenation on my thoughts behind why we should abstract the logic around platform checking to a method.

Made this PR to resolve this issue:
#166099

I'll update the code in this PR once that one is merged.

Helps unblock #165531 and is part of #165510 *If you had to change anything in the [flutter/tests] repo, include a link to the migration guide as per the [breaking change policy].* ## Pre-launch Checklist - [x] I read the [Contributor Guide] and followed the process outlined there for submitting PRs. - [x] I read the [Tree Hygiene] wiki page, which explains my responsibilities. - [x] I read and followed the [Flutter Style Guide], including [Features we expect every widget to implement]. - [x] I signed the [CLA]. - [x] I listed at least one issue that this PR fixes in the description above. - [x] I updated/added relevant documentation (doc comments with `///`). - [x] I added new tests to check the change I am making, or this PR is [test-exempt]. - [x] I followed the [breaking change policy] and added [Data Driven Fixes] where supported. - [x] All existing and new tests are passing. If you need help, consider asking for advice on the #hackers-new channel on [Discord].  [Contributor Guide]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Tree-hygiene.md#overview [Tree Hygiene]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Tree-hygiene.md [test-exempt]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Tree-hygiene.md#tests [Flutter Style Guide]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Style-guide-for-Flutter-repo.md [Features we expect every widget to implement]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Style-guide-for-Flutter-repo.md#features-we-expect-every-widget-to-implement [CLA]: https://cla.developers.google.com/ [flutter/tests]: https://github.com/flutter/tests [breaking change policy]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Tree-hygiene.md#handling-breaking-changes [Discord]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Chat.md [Data Driven Fixes]: https://github.com/flutter/flutter/blob/main/docs/contributing/Data-driven-Fixes.md

matanlurey · 2025-05-07T00:59:07Z

+  /// announcements are generally supported without discouragement.
+  ///
+  /// Use this flag to conditionally avoid making announcements on Android.
+  bool get noAnnounce => _kNoAnnounceIndex & _index != 0;


This is a relatively minor issue, and if you've already discussed this with others more knowledgable of a11y work feel free to disregard - but the negative qualifier no is sort of confusing (to me), at least after reading the description:

/// Returns `false` on all other platforms (iOS, web, desktop) where such /// announcements are generally supported without discouragement.

I'd expect to see something like:

/// Whether accessibility announcements (like [SemanticsService.announce]) /// are encouraged on the current platform. /// /// Returns `false` on Android, where platform announcements are deprecated /// by the underlying platform. /// /// Returns `true` on all other platforms (iOS, web, desktop) where such /// announcements are generally supported without discouragement. /// /// Use this flag to conditionally make announcements. bool get announce => _kAnnounceIndex & _index != 0;

The issue with positive notion is that for most platform it will be true. This may break exisiting embedder because this is a bit map and default value is 0.

We could rephrase it to be positive for example preferLiveRegion. That said I think we are not actually preferring live region but instead discouraging announce.

I mean a cheap option is just bool get announce => _kAnnounceIndex & _index == 0.

Anyway, just trying to get ahead of understanding:

if (!noAnnounce) { /* ... */ }

That sounds like a pretty good solution. Just gotta add some comments explaining that this is intentional and not a bug.

How about we use _kNoAnnounceIndex for the embedder and announce for the API?

That way we can avoid confusion?

I care a lot less about the implementation detail, so SGTM

…/use-liveregion-form

ash2moon · 2025-05-09T15:40:22Z

Just did my final round of testing on two real devices and made sure the media queries and announcement forking logic works well.

auto-submit · 2025-05-09T16:24:13Z

autosubmit label was removed for flutter/flutter/165531, because - The status or check suite Linux linux_web_engine_tests has failed. Please fix the issues identified (or deflake) before re-applying this label.

The status or check suite Windows framework_tests_widgets has failed. Please fix the issues identified (or deflake) before re-applying this label.
The status or check suite Mac framework_tests_widgets has failed. Please fix the issues identified (or deflake) before re-applying this label.
The status or check suite Mac framework_tests_impeller has failed. Please fix the issues identified (or deflake) before re-applying this label.

…nges by platform

matanlurey · 2025-05-14T17:43:00Z

reason for revert: Breaks google client tests

ash2moon changed the title ~~Use live region in form~~ Use live region in error text input decorator Mar 20, 2025

ash2moon requested review from a team and hannah-hyj March 20, 2025 00:02

ash2moon force-pushed the feat/use-liveregion-form branch 2 times, most recently from e58f957 to 675d730 Compare March 21, 2025 19:59

github-actions Bot removed platform-android Android applications specifically engine flutter/engine related. See also e: labels. a: accessibility Accessibility, e.g. VoiceOver or TalkBack. (aka a11y) labels Mar 21, 2025

ash2moon force-pushed the feat/use-liveregion-form branch from 804b5d4 to 248d5ab Compare March 21, 2025 20:07

ash2moon force-pushed the feat/use-liveregion-form branch from 7da36ca to 509583c Compare March 21, 2025 20:14

hannah-hyj reviewed Mar 24, 2025

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hannah-hyj approved these changes Mar 24, 2025

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reidbaker requested changes Mar 25, 2025

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ash2moon mentioned this pull request Mar 27, 2025

add check for announcement support per platform #166099

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ash2moon changed the title ~~Use live region in error text input decorator~~ Use live region in error text input decorator for Android Mar 31, 2025

ash2moon force-pushed the feat/use-liveregion-form branch from 509583c to d2d38d9 Compare March 31, 2025 19:10

github-actions Bot added the a: accessibility Accessibility, e.g. VoiceOver or TalkBack. (aka a11y) label Mar 31, 2025

ash2moon force-pushed the feat/use-liveregion-form branch 2 times, most recently from 5347271 to 20db932 Compare March 31, 2025 19:27

ash2moon added 2 commits May 6, 2025 10:36

use noAnnounce for checking if announce is supported

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use noAnnounce for checking if announce is supported

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matanlurey reviewed May 7, 2025

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ash2moon added 5 commits May 7, 2025 11:56

flip noAnnounce to announce

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flip noAnnounce to announce

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Merge branch 'master' of https://github.com/flutter/flutter into feat…

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Merge branch 'master' of https://github.com/flutter/flutter into feat…

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doc update

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gmackall reviewed May 8, 2025

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Comment thread packages/flutter/lib/src/semantics/semantics_service.dart Outdated

ash2moon added 3 commits May 8, 2025 17:32

doc update

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doc update

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Merge branch 'master' of https://github.com/flutter/flutter into feat…

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ash2moon added 9 commits May 9, 2025 10:17

fix flaky test (MediaQueryData.fromView is sane) announce feature cha…

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Merge branch 'master' into feat/use-liveregion-form

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ash2moon mentioned this pull request May 12, 2025

Can't get Google tests to pass #168681

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engine-flutter-autoroll mentioned this pull request May 14, 2025

Roll Flutter from 336a7ecf7b40 to 0b9f9288caf3 (22 revisions) flutter/packages#9251

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auto-submit Bot mentioned this pull request May 14, 2025

Reverts "Use live region in error text input decorator for Android (#165531)" #168848

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ash2moon mentioned this pull request May 16, 2025

Add back "Use live region in error text input decorator for Android #165531" #168992

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Piinks mentioned this pull request May 16, 2025

Flutter Notable Commits - 2025 #161460

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ash2moon mentioned this pull request May 29, 2025

Add announce support to the engine #169685

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