Re: 2.4.7 Focus Visible

On 10/07/2023 13:41, Michael Livesey wrote:

> I would therefore propose a rewording of 2.4.7 to include Focus Visible 
> on mouse click also, or at the very least an advisory warning developers 
> not to abuse 2.4.7 as an excuse to disable focus on click.

This would be a normative change to WCAG, which is very difficult to 
push through at this late stage.

Incidentally, I'll note that the whole advantage of the :focus-visible 
approach is that this is finally in the control of the browser/user 
agent, as it taps into their own built-in heuristics that they're 
already applying by default (as even without *any* author CSS, most/all 
modern browsers will just not show a focus indicator on things like 
buttons as a result of a mouse click already).

And because of this, browsers can now also offer accessibility 
settings/options for users to explicitly request focus always be shown 
even for mouse interactions (compared to previous situations where 
they'd otherwise have had to ignore :focus completely and try to force 
their own styles).

Lastly, the result of trying to redefine 2.4.7 to now explicitly also 
fail cases where focus is not shown as a result of mouse interaction 
will simply result in the vast majority of the web as it is now 
immediately failing the criterion, or at the very least bringing up very 
awkward questions about the fact that a site that simply did nothing 
didn't account for the fact that browsers themselves nowadays don't show 
the indicator for mouse interactions on most controls...which means this 
type of change is unlikely to get support from all the parties involved 
in the WCAG standardisation process...

P
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Patrick H. Lauke

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Received on Monday, 10 July 2023 14:27:46 UTC