Re: accesskey feedback

On Fri, 19 Jun 2009 14:39:01 +0200, Olivier GENDRIN  
<olivier.gendrin@gmail.com> wrote:

> On Wed, Jun 17, 2009 at 1:50 PM, Simon Pieters<simonp@opera.com> wrote:
...
>> A UA might want to change an element's access key in the following
>> situation:
...
>
> I agree with the idea you have in mind, but I think it's
> counter-productive on some websites. Those website that uses
> accesskeys have pages devoted to the accessibility mechanisms
> available on the website [1], where they give the list of the
> accesskeys. If the UA changes the accesskeys, theses pages become
> false.

This is true. Unfortunately, it comes from not thinking through the  
attribute in the first place.

Another situation where changing accesskeys would make sense is in  
presenting an english page, using numbers for accesskeys, to a french  
azerty keyboard user where shift is required to activate the numbers.

And another would be presenting the page on Opera Mini on a handset that  
doesn't have all the keys named.

As it happens, that page is already false. Opera on Mac OS X has support  
for access keys, unlike what the page claims. But this isn't just a little  
whine - in general, maintaining such pages is done poorly. It would be far  
more efficient to have the browser provide the accesskey information  
directly than to have the page try to do so. (Almost a decade the User  
Agent Accesibility Guidelines included a requirement to do just this, in  
recognition of the original problem...)

> [1] http://www.laposte.fr/layout/set/popup_footer/content/view/full/164,
> in french

cheers

Chaals

-- 
Charles McCathieNevile  Opera Software, Standards Group
     je parle français -- hablo español -- jeg lærer norsk
http://my.opera.com/chaals       Try Opera: http://www.opera.com

Received on Friday, 19 June 2009 18:19:30 UTC