JAWS ignores separators in the menu and submenus in Chrome.

[matoaaa]

Summary

JAWS ignores separators in the menu and submenus in Chrome.
When reading position of menuitem and total number of number of items in the menu or submenu it ignores separators and therefore reads incorrect current and total numbers.

Example:

1. Go to https://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria-practices/examples/menubar/menubar-1/menubar-1.html# using Chrome and JAWS
2. Focus Admissions and press space

Expected result

JAWS reads: Apply 1 of 3

Actual result

JAWS reads: Apply 1 of 6

Example

https://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria-practices/examples/menubar/menubar-1/menubar-1.html#

Additional Information

The same behaviour can be observed for any submenu in the example above.
Other combinations of browser and screen readers work correctly with the example above. (Chrome + NVDA, Firefox + JAWS, Firefox + NVDA)

JAWS version and build number

JAWS
Professional Edition
2020.2006.12 ILM

Operating System and version

OS Name Microsoft Windows 10 Enterprise 2016 LTSB
Version 10.0.14393 Build 14393

Browser and version:

Google Chrome
Version 83.0.4103.116 (Official Build) (64-bit)

[JAWS-test]

I can confirm the test results, but I wonder if the criticized output is even better than the standard output. When I reach the last menu item of the group and hear "3 of 3", I assume that I am at the end of the menu and do not navigate any further. Therefore I find the output without separator better because I hear the actual number of menu items ("3 of 6"), which seems more important to me.

Related: w3c/aria-practices#614

In my opinion, the ARIA specification does not prescribe a concrete output for separator within menu. But there is the possibility to group the menuitems (separated by separator) and label the groups (with role=group and aria-label or aria-labelledby). This would solve the problem, but unfortunately, JAWS does not output the groups and their labels (see #381).