Re: Rethinking the necessities of ARIA landmark role "main" and HTML5 <main> element

hi Ian,

you wrote:

About the "skip to main content" link, I have heard suggestions said that
> it's also useful for some other users (laptop users, etc) who can only
> navigate by using keyboard. So maybe it should not be replaced even if AT
> are all working well with ARIA landmark roles


The W3C HTML specification of main [1] contains the following note:

Note: User agents that support keyboard navigation of content are strongly
> encouraged to provide a method to navigate to the main element and once
> navigated to, ensure the next element in the focus order is the first
> focusable element within the main element. This will provide a simple
> method for keyboard users to bypass blocks of content such as navigation
> links.
>

Myself and others are working with browser vendors to get this implemented.
Of course it is not advised to abandon skip links until this is broadly
implemented

[1]
http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/grouping-content.html#the-main-element


with regards

--
SteveF
HTML 5.1 <http://www.w3.org/html/wg/drafts/html/master/>
<http://www.paciellogroup.com/resources/wat-ie-about.html>


On 24 March 2013 03:24, Ian Yang <ian@invigoreight.com> wrote:

> On Sun, Mar 24, 2013 at 8:33 AM, Charles McCathie Nevile <
> chaals@yandex-team.ru> wrote:
>
>> A major reason for the element is to replace the "skip to main content"
>> links that are all over the web, for accessibility purposes. While the use
>> of those links is a terrible bit of architecture (they only work if you
>> start from the top of the page and navigate with the keyboard, etc etc)
>> they are deemed useful enough to include on all kinds of websites whose
>> designs have been through multiple rounds of usability testing to ensure
>> they make sense in practice.
>>
>
> Hi Charles,
>
> Thanks for your opinion.
>
> About the "skip to main content" link, I have heard suggestions said that
> it's also useful for some other users (laptop users, etc) who can only
> navigate by using keyboard. So maybe it should not be replaced even if AT
> are all working well with ARIA landmark roles.
>
> Kind Regards,
> Ian Yang
>