RE: Skip to content link

As a screen reader user for about 20 years , I have never used either a skip
to link or a back to link to navigate a view because these features are
typically poorly implemented and support for conventional implementations
has been inconsistent during this time. 

 

By 'poor implementation' I mean mechanisms that don't actually move virtual
cursor focus, land on the same spot for every view regardless of their
content, land on the first natively focusable element in content, skip past
useful information, skip to irrelevant parts of the screen, and so on . the
feature-presence checklist approach to WCAG is much to blame here in my
view.

 

 

 

But, more importantly, why would I bother using a skip link when screen
reader applications provide much more efficient and diverse ways of entering
the content of a view . 

 

people who are trained to use a screen reader in this country typically
don't use skip features either in my experience because their navigational
strategies - just like the functionality offered in screen readers - is
element based . e.g., quick use key navigation in JAWS-speak.

Putting the very limited sample of the WebAIM SR users survey aside, I'd be
interested to know whether people who use a screen reader as a result of a
lack of functional vision actually use these features and under what
circumstances . or whether this is just yet another accessibility industry
sacred cow.

 

 

 

 

 

From: Tom Shaw <tom-shaw@hotmail.com> 
Sent: Friday, March 8, 2024 12:12 AM
To: w3c-wai-ig@w3.org
Subject: Skip to content link

 

Hi there.

I have a very long GOV.UK process with lots of pages. The first page I
activate the skip to content link and it works as expected, however, for the
rest of the hjourney users are now automatically taken to the main content
everytime because the anchor in the URL #main-content' is always there. So
it often skips the h1, hint text, back link etc....therefore I'd say
affecting SR and KO users. I understand this is a potentially a backend
mistake but I still feel this falls under 2.4.3 Focus Order? Is this right?

Thank you.