Re: [note: two-level nav in WAI-ARIA] [was: Re: reCAPTCHA implementation problems]

On Wed, 18 Jul 2007 05:26:07 +0100, Ben Maurer <bmaurer@andrew.cmu.edu>  
wrote:

> I think that (at least for people without disabilities) providing a tab  
> order that reflects the most common navigation path can be beneficial.

Sure. But the tab order has to reflect the worflow all the way through. If  
you have to move a zillion times to get back to add a subject or CC, there  
are serious problems. About 3/4 of my mail uses a Cc, about 10% a Bcc -  
maybe I am a little unusual, but maybe not. And very nearly all of the  
mail I compose directly is to people in my contacts list.

> Take Gmail. To composte an email,one can press "c" which brings up the  
> following window:
...
> The "to" textbox is focused, one tab  goes to subject, next to the  
> content box.
...
> While functionalities such as "add cc" or "forgot your username" are  
> unarguably important, they also cleary distract from the workflow that  
> goes on 99% of the time (even with CAPTCHA, we're frequently not the  
> last element in a form, stuff like accepting ToS comes after us -- so  
> enter doesn't work).

Hmm. The "select from contacts" function is something I only use about 95%  
of the time.

> Is there no way to say "this link isn't part of the normal work flow,  
> don't put it in the tab flow. However still let people get to it without  
> the mouse"? It seems like having tabs be the only way to make an element  
> accessible to the keyboard is an issue for some sites.

accesskey is designed to provide accelerated access to things. It is badly  
specified, and badly implemented in some browsers, but it is still about  
the best there is. And can be well implemented on the same markup.

How you move around is ultimately a function of the browser, not the page.  
Opera provides several different ways to navigate (by link, or by form  
control, or by header, or in 2-D, or with accesskeys) from the keyboard -  
other browsers do some of this. And phone browsers and the like make the  
picture reasonably complex. Pages that try to specify how navigation works  
fail more often they succeed, whereas pages that provide clear structures  
and waypoints, allowing browsers to provide navigation that is useful, are  
more helpful to the web.

just my 2 øre

Chaals

-- 
   Charles McCathieNevile, Opera Software: Standards Group
   hablo español  -  je parle français  -  jeg lærer norsk
chaals@opera.com    Catch up: Speed Dial   http://opera.com

Received on Wednesday, 18 July 2007 05:54:18 UTC