Quick (hopefully) question about WCAG 2 glossary definition of "keyboard interface"

Hi Gregg,

as part of our work in the Mobile A11y TF, I started looking at some 
aspects of existing glossary definitions as they relate to input, to see 
where touchscreen, touchscreen with AT, and similar scenarios can be 
included/need to be harmonized.

One aspect that I'd like to quiz you about (David McDonald seemed to 
remember you had strong feelings about this specific wording at the 
time) is this: is there a very specific reason why "keyboard interface" 
https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/#keybrd-interfacedef explicitly talks about 
"keystroke input"?  Main reason is that for many common scenarios for 
touchscreen with AT - for instance, VoiceOver on an iPhone - swiping 
left/right achieves "sequential navigation" (in the sense of 
https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/#nav-seqdef), but it does NOT fire 
keystrokes (i.e. no "faked" TAB/SHIFT+TAB key events, or cursor/arrow 
left/right key events, are exposed...but the VoiceOver focus IS moved 
sequentially). The spirit, and actual SCs, for 2.1 would apply to this 
mode of sequential navigation on touchscreen+AT devices, but the 
"keystroke input" part obviously precludes this.

In short, just trying to understand if I'm missing a very specific 
reason for the exact "keystroke" wording, or if there's potential (maybe 
for future versions of WCAG) to modify the definition slightly to also 
make any 2.1 related SCs also cover touchscreen+AT without the need for 
unnecessary duplication of intents.

Thanks,

P
-- 
Patrick H. Lauke

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Received on Thursday, 23 June 2016 19:51:31 UTC