RE: Operable Grid Cell

According to the APG, you can make a gridcell operable with any kind of 
widget that will not consume the keys used to navigate the grid. The only 
limitation is that there is only one operable element inside the cell. If 
there is more than one, then the grid must change to "actionable" mode.

For example, a grid of buttons with one button per cell allows the user to 
press enter or space with focus on a cell and the button is activated.

The APG says:
"Option: the author may choose to enable 'auto action' on a cell in order 
to avoid having to press Enter or F2 a second time to activate the default 
behavior of the object contained in a cell. For example, if the cell 
contains a single link the author may want to have enter follow the link 
rather than just move focus to it. This auto action mode should be 
configurable on a per cell basis as its utility is dependent on each 
cell's content. For example, if the cell contains multiple links, auto 
action should be disabled as its behavior would be ambiguous."[1]

There is quite a bit in the grid section of the APG that I would like to 
see changed. But, I think this particular point makes sense and may 
address the issue being raised in this thread.

[1] http://www.w3.org/WAI/PF/aria-practices/#grid


Matt King
IBM Senior Technical Staff Member
I/T Chief Accessibility Strategist
IBM BT/CIO - Global Workforce and Web Process Enablement 
Phone: (503) 578-2329, Tie line: 731-7398
mattking@us.ibm.com



From:   Alexander Surkov <surkov.alexander@gmail.com>
To:     Bryan Garaventa <bryan.garaventa@ssbbartgroup.com>, 
Cc:     Alexander Surkov <asurkov@mozilla.com>, Joseph Scheuhammer 
<clown@alum.mit.edu>, Yura Zenevich <yzenevich@mozilla.com>, "W3C WAI 
Protocols & Formats" <public-pfwg@w3.org>
Date:   09/29/2014 11:22 AM
Subject:        RE: Operable Grid Cell



Right. Multiple roles approach should fit them all. Afaik ARIA spec 
doesn't allow it currently. Do you know if there are reasons of it?
On Sep 29, 2014 2:08 PM, "Bryan Garaventa" <
bryan.garaventa@ssbbartgroup.com> wrote:
I agree that it would be great to find a way to convey gridcell type 
differences within interactive grid constructs.
 
For example, one grid may contain gridcell nodes that control editable 
strings, toggles, listboxes, and variable embedded control types within 
one gridcell as mentioned. Without a mechanism to identify the differences 
when arrowing between each, the key commands for each can’t be reliably 
conveyed.
 
From: Alexander Surkov [mailto:surkov.alexander@gmail.com] 
Sent: Monday, September 29, 2014 10:55 AM
To: Yura Zenevich
Cc: Joseph Scheuhammer; Alexander Surkov; W3C WAI Protocols & Formats
Subject: Re: Operable Grid Cell
 
Hi. I think I prefer improving ARIA markup flexibility over introduction 
the new roles. So being able to specify bunch of roles could be a nice 
solution here, like role="gridcell button". Also I like the idea to extend 
list of allowed attributes for roles like having aria-pressed on gridcell 
would point out the gridcell also has button behavior. (It might not work 
for this particular case since aria-pressed is used for toggle buttons 
though).
On Sep 29, 2014 10:50 AM, "Yura Zenevich" <yzenevich@mozilla.com> wrote:
Hello everyone,

I am currently looking at numerous calendar widget implementations that 
have month views that look like grids. ARIA roles grid and gridcell are 
used in some of these implementations. The user is able to click/tap each 
grid cell to get access to the list of events for a particular date. The 
AT user, however, will not be able to perform this interaction with the 
out of the box implementation:

when working with operable lists, the implementer will generally opt in 
for using 'listbox' and 'option' roles in favour of static list and 
listitem. However, there's no such alternative when using 'grid' and 
'gridcell'.

The author would have to add extra workarounds (via event handlers on 
specific grid cells instead of using event bubbling, etc) to make it 
operable by the ATs. It would be really great if it was possible via the 
readily available attributes in the HTML.

Some possible solutions are as follows:

* Using a new gridcelloption role or similar (just like option in the 
listbox)
* Using an aria-pressed attribute, that would indicate that the grid cell 
is operable, if present (both with true and false values).

Perhaps there are other working implementations our there that you might 
know of?

Thanks

Yura Zenevich
Mozilla