Add lang attribute to elements showing metadata values by AndreaBarbasso · Pull Request #4776 · DSpace/dspace-angular

AndreaBarbasso · 2025-10-16T08:56:54Z

References

Fixes [Accessibility] lang attribute needed for metadata values #435

Description

Applied lang attribute to HTML tags containing metadata with an explicit language value.

Instructions for Reviewers

The lang attribute has been added via different approaches:

If the metadata string value was shown via innerHTML, that property has now been replaced with the new dsMetadata directive, that accepts a MetadataValue and applies the innerHTML property and the lang attribute to its host element. Having a directive for this purpose is useful since we can later add other attributes if necessary and is more feasible than a component.
Otherwise, the lang attribute has been applied to the closest available element.

List of changes in this PR:

Created and applied the new dsMetadata directive;
Applied the lang attribute where using the directive could lead to unwanted behaviors.

To test the PR, change any metadata language value and make sure that the value is added to the lang attribute of its containing element, wherever it's reflected (e.g. item pages, search results, ...).

Checklist

AndreaBarbasso · 2025-10-16T09:44:59Z

@tdonohue, tests are failing because of invalid values for the lang attribute.

A lot of metadata fields have the language set to en_US, but the correct value is en-US.
~~I think the best course of action here is avoiding front-end manipulation of those values, and change them on the fixture instead.~~

EDIT: after further research, I see that the difference is caused by different standards for in web technologies (IETF BCP 47) and Java/POSIX systems.
So, I guess the best course of action is to convert them on the front-end.

AndreaBarbasso · 2025-10-16T14:45:23Z

As discussed today, I am going to open an issue on the REST side to discuss if we need to change the chosen standard for language codes.
Meanwhile, I will add a simple way to make a11y tests pass and to give a valid string to lang attributes, by replacing the _ with a -.

github-actions · 2025-11-10T20:19:25Z

Hi @AndreaBarbasso,
Conflicts have been detected against the base branch.
Please resolve these conflicts as soon as you can. Thanks!

# Conflicts: # src/app/entity-groups/journal-entities/item-list-elements/search-result-list-elements/journal-issue/journal-issue-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/journal-entities/item-list-elements/search-result-list-elements/journal-volume/journal-volume-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/journal-entities/item-list-elements/search-result-list-elements/journal/journal-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/item-list-elements/search-result-list-elements/org-unit/org-unit-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/item-list-elements/search-result-list-elements/person/person-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/submission/item-list-elements/org-unit/org-unit-search-result-list-submission-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/submission/item-list-elements/person/person-search-result-list-submission-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-detail/my-dspace-result-detail-element/item-detail-preview/item-detail-preview-field/item-detail-preview-field.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-detail/my-dspace-result-detail-element/search-result-detail-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-grid/search-result-grid-element/search-result-grid-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/metadata-representation-list-element/browse-link/browse-link-metadata-list-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/metadata-representation-list-element/plain-text/plain-text-metadata-list-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/collection-search-result/collection-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/community-search-result/community-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/themes/custom/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/item-search-result/item-types/item/item-search-result-list-element.component.ts

github-actions · 2025-11-19T22:58:11Z

Hi @AndreaBarbasso,
Conflicts have been detected against the base branch.
Please resolve these conflicts as soon as you can. Thanks!

jrcwiok

Item page - language attribute shows up

search results - language attribute does not show up - should it?

# Conflicts: # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/metadata-representations/org-unit/org-unit-item-metadata-list-element.component.html # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/metadata-representations/org-unit/org-unit-item-metadata-list-element.component.ts # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/metadata-representations/person/person-item-metadata-list-element.component.html # src/app/entity-groups/research-entities/metadata-representations/person/person-item-metadata-list-element.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/my-dspace-result-list-element/item-list-preview/item-list-preview.component.html # src/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/item-search-result/item-types/item/item-search-result-list-element.component.html

alegontarz · 2026-02-20T11:27:06Z

QA testing performed (no code review).
Working as expected:

Metadata values with an explicit language (e.g. publisher, abstract) correctly receive the lang attribute.
Not working as expected:
Observed that the Title (dc.title) does not have a lang attribute applied, even when a language value is set.

github-actions · 2026-03-13T17:36:17Z

Hi @AndreaBarbasso,
Conflicts have been detected against the base branch.
Please resolve these conflicts as soon as you can. Thanks!

tdonohue · 2026-03-24T16:31:11Z

@AndreaBarbasso : Could you update this PR to solve the merge conflict when you have a chance? Thanks!

…T-19328 # Conflicts: # src/app/item-page/field-components/metadata-values/metadata-values.component.html # src/app/item-page/field-components/metadata-values/metadata-values.component.spec.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/my-dspace-result-list-element/item-list-preview/item-list-preview.component.html # src/app/shared/object-list/my-dspace-result-list-element/item-list-preview/item-list-preview.component.ts # src/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/item-search-result/item-types/item/item-search-result-list-element.component.html # src/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/item-search-result/item-types/item/item-search-result-list-element.component.ts # src/themes/custom/app/shared/object-list/my-dspace-result-list-element/item-list-preview/item-list-preview.component.ts # src/themes/custom/app/shared/object-list/search-result-list-element/item-search-result/item-types/item/item-search-result-list-element.component.ts

tdonohue

@AndreaBarbasso : Thanks for this PR. I've tested & reviewed it today. Overall, the basics are working...but I can reproduce the issues reported by others above:

In the search results, the lang attribute never exists if hit highlighting has occurred. To reproduce:
- Find an Item, add an abstract and set the language.
- Verify the lang attribute exists in the Abstract on the Item page
- Now search for a term in the abstract.
- Verify the lang attribute does NOT exist in the Abstract in the search results when hit highlighting occurs. Is it supposed to have a lang attribute?
- (However, I can verify the lang attribute does exist if you just browse to the item and don't trigger hit highlighting)
The title of an Item never shows a lang attribute. To reproduce:
- Find an Item and set the language of the Title (dc.title) to "en" (or any other value).
- Verify on the Item page that the Title field doesn't have a lang attribute`.
- This seems like a bug as the Title should display a language when one exists.

I have a few other inline comments below. There's a few methods that are repeated in several areas of the code and I think it'd be better to not repeat them. I'm also trying to understand why you needed to create these methods, so I feel they need a better description.

Beyond those issues, the basic functionality is working well.

tdonohue · 2026-04-13T17:58:53Z

+   * @param {string|string[]} keyOrKeys The metadata key(s) in scope. Wildcards are supported; see [[Metadata]].
+   * @returns {MetadataValue[]} the matching values or an empty array.
+   */
+  allMetadata(keyOrKeys: string | string[]): MetadataValue[] {


Could you explain why this change is necessary in order to add the lang attribute? Why are we having to change our approach to getting all the metadata to include also the hitHighlights? I'm just not understanding the purpose behind this change, so that implies we may need to describe this method better as to why we need to do this.

@tdonohue, to create this method I simply took the previously used method and changed it so that it returns an array of Metadata objects instead of an array of strings. I did this to avoid any regression issue and keep backwards compatibility.
I agree with it being found in too many places - that's an ongoing issue with some other methods in these files, but I can start by applying some DRY on this method!

tdonohue · 2026-04-13T17:59:53Z

+   * @param {string|string[]} keyOrKeys The metadata key(s) in scope. Wildcards are supported; see [[Metadata]].
+   * @returns {MetadataValue[]} the matching values or an empty array.
+   */
+  allMetadata(keyOrKeys: string | string[]): MetadataValue[] {


Noticing this same method is repeated in several components. Is there a way we could pull this out into a utility method instead of repeating it over and over again?

tdonohue · 2026-04-13T18:00:35Z

+   * @param {string|string[]} keyOrKeys The metadata key(s) in scope. Wildcards are supported; see [[Metadata]].
+   * @returns {MetadataValue} the first matching value, or `undefined`.
+   */
+  firstMetadata(keyOrKeys: string | string[]): MetadataValue {


Same here. This is repeated in several components. It'd be better not to repeat the same methods over and over...because if we find a bug in one we may not remember to fix all of them.

github-actions · 2026-04-30T22:11:28Z

Hi @AndreaBarbasso,
Conflicts have been detected against the base branch.
Please resolve these conflicts as soon as you can. Thanks!

…19328 # Conflicts: # src/app/item-page/field-components/metadata-values/metadata-values.component.html

AndreaBarbasso · 2026-05-13T14:00:36Z

@tdonohue, I applied the same logic to dso titles and hitHighlight-ed descriptions. I also refactored the code to improve DRYness.

tdonohue

@AndreaBarbasso : I retested this today. While the hit highlighting bug is fixed, I'm still not seeing the lang=[lang-code] attribute on Item titles on the Item page. Here's how to reproduce it:

Administer an Item and set the language of the Title (dc.title) to "en" (or any other value).
Go back to the Item's page and view the source of the page.
Notice that the Title field (displayed in an <h1>) does NOT have a lang attribute.
However, if you search for that Item by it's title, the lang attribute WILL APPEAR if you view the source of the search results page.

AndreaBarbasso · 2026-05-19T10:53:09Z

@tdonohue, my bad, I was so focused on the item title in search result elements that I forgot that part.
I'm pushing a new commit in a minute!

tdonohue

👍 Thanks @AndreaBarbasso ! I've verified this is now working properly. Looks good to me now.

Andrea Barbasso added 3 commits October 15, 2025 16:18

[CST-19328] create dsMetadata directive, use it outside item pages

f9c54e5

[CST-19328] add lang attribute in metadata-values.component

5203ffa

[CST-19328] add lang attribute in representation components

8ca81ed

github-actions Bot assigned AndreaBarbasso Oct 16, 2025

AndreaBarbasso changed the title ~~Task/main/cst 19328~~ Add lang attribute to elements showing metadata values Oct 16, 2025

AndreaBarbasso mentioned this pull request Oct 17, 2025

Consider adopting BCP 47 language codes (e.g. en-US) in lieu of POSIX ones (e.g. en_US) DSpace/DSpace#11448

Open

[CST-16756] create dsNormalizeLanguageCode pipe

6bb3212

github-actions Bot added the merge conflict label Nov 10, 2025

github-actions Bot removed the merge conflict label Nov 13, 2025

tdonohue added accessibility component: Item (Archived) Item display or editing labels Nov 13, 2025

tdonohue added this to DSpace 10.0 Release Nov 13, 2025

tdonohue moved this to 🙋 Needs Reviewers Assigned in DSpace 10.0 Release Nov 13, 2025

github-actions Bot added the merge conflict label Nov 19, 2025

jrcwiok reviewed Dec 19, 2025

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Andrea Barbasso added 2 commits February 10, 2026 10:12

[CST-19328] align with main, solve conflicts

3175ef7

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alegontarz moved this from 🙋 Needs Reviewers Assigned to 🏗 In Progress in DSpace 10.0 Release Feb 20, 2026

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github-actions Bot added the merge conflict label Mar 13, 2026

[CST-19328] added lang attribute to metadata-link-view component

f8785db

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Merge remote-tracking branch 'github_dspace/main' into task/main/CST-…

0e7f82b

…19328 # Conflicts: # src/app/item-page/field-components/metadata-values/metadata-values.component.html

github-actions Bot removed the merge conflict label May 13, 2026

[CST-19328] handle language on hitHighlights and titles

5a7f8f8

AndreaBarbasso force-pushed the task/main/CST-19328 branch from 94ae8fa to 5a7f8f8 Compare May 13, 2026 15:40

atarix83 requested a review from tdonohue May 14, 2026 12:55

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[CST-19328] add lang attribute to item title

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AndreaBarbasso commented Oct 16, 2025

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Instructions for Reviewers

Checklist

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