Re: Keyboard Behaviors for Elements with Role "Grid"

Chris Blouch wrote:

> The next hurdle would be to edit a cell. If we are already using  
> arrows to navigate the grid how do we handle the overloading to  
> navigate within a cell? I suggest that once the user starts typing  
> alphanumeric characters they are now in "edit mode"  or have chosen  
> to "interact with", in Apple Voice Over parlance, that particular  
> cell. Maybe there should be an extra key to interact but the  
> alphanumeric trigger could be sufficient. Once in edit mode the  
> arrows move through the cell content instead of the grid content.  
> Once editing is completed the user would need to get out of edit  
> mode. I would suggest Enter as a reasonable key that users might  
> try. One objection is that enter is often the submit function, but  
> this can be overridden and should be when in edit mode. This could  
> be a bit tricky if the grid cell content actually contains more  
> widgets so I would suggest that when the user is "interacting with"  
> a cell, tab and other general navigation become active but are  
> constrained to items within the cell until they stop interacting  
> with that cell.

The idea of "interacting with" a sub-level ARIA widget solves a lot of  
complexity problems. In my opinion though, Enter and its counterpart,  
Escape, should be reserved for primary actions such as confirming or  
canceling forms and dialogs.

What about:

	Shift + Down Arrow to "interact with" a sub-level item.
	Shift + Up Arrow to "stop interacting with" a sub-level item.

	Shift + Right Arrow to navigate to the next non-read-only item/cell  
in the list/grid.
	Shift + Left Arrow to navigate to the previous non-read-only item/ 
cell in the list/grid.

Unlike the other modifier keys (control, alt, option, command,  
windows), shift if pretty consistent across browsers and platforms,  
and is rarely reserved by the browser. The only place I can see where  
this would cause trouble is with text selection using arrow keys, and  
ARIA widgets are already intercepting those arrow keys anyway.