- From: Becky Gibson <Becky_Gibson@notesdev.ibm.com>
- Date: Tue, 25 Mar 2008 08:41:01 -0400
- To: wai-xtech@w3.org
My interpretation of an auto-complete widget is some type of a combo-box
where the choices offered are filtered by the information typed into the
box. An editable auto-complete allows choices that are not in the list to
be entered. An example of an editable auto-complete is the URL field in
the browsers.
With focus in the textbox portion of the widget the user may:
- Click in the empty text box or on an associated icon display the entire
list of choices in a drop-down. Most auto-complete widgets will have an
arrow or icon associated with the textbox.
-press the up or down arrow or alt+down or alt+up arrow to display the
list of choices - focus remains in the textbox and no choice is
highlighted. Press the down arrow to highlight the first choice in the
list; press the up arrow to highlight the last choice in the list. Press
the arrow keys to reach the desired choice in the list. Or, move the
mouse pointer over and item in the list to highlight it. The highlighted
choice is displayed in the textbox. Press enter or click on the
highlighted choice to select it.
-type a letter. If any of the available choices begin with the letter
typed, those choices are displayed in a drop down. Pressing the down
arrow highlights the first choice in the list, pressing the up arrow
highlights the last choice in the list. The user may move the mouse
pointer over the items in the list to highlight a choice. The highlighted
choice is displayed in the text box. The user presses enter or clicks on a
choice to select a highlighted choice. Once a choice is selected (via
enter or mouse click) the drop down list of choices is closed and the
selected choice is displayed in the textbox.
-type several letters. As the user types letters the list of choices is
filtered so that only those that begin with the typed letters are
displayed. Until the user presses the arrow keys or uses the mouse
pointer to highlight a particular choice, only the typed letters are
displayed in the textbox. In an editable auto-complete, If there are no
choices that match the letter(s) typed, the drop down list of choices is
closed. In a non-editable auto-complete any letters which do not result in
a match from the list are ignored, the drop down list of choices remains
static until the user presses escape to clear the text field, backspaces
to remove some of the letters previously typed, or types an additional
letter that results in a valid list of choices.
-press escape. If there is no text in the textbox, pressing escape does
nothing. With text in the textbox (either typed directly by the user or
via highlighting a choice from the drop down) pressing escape clears the
text in the textbox. In an editable auto-complete, if the list of choices
was open, it is closed. For an auto-complete that is not editable, the
user must make some selection. In this case pressing escape may display
the entire list of choices via the drop down, invoke an error, or return
the field to a default value (which could also be the behavior of an
editable auto-complete).
Becky Gibson
Web Accessibility Architect
IBM Emerging Internet Technologies
5 Technology Park Drive
Westford, MA 01886
Voice: 978 399-6101; t/l 333-6101
Email: gibsonb@us.ibm.com
blog: WebA11y
Received on Tuesday, 25 March 2008 12:41:48 UTC