WebAIM - Web Accessibility In Mind

E-mail List Archives

Re: drop down/jump menus

for

From: tklm@lineone.net
Date: Jul 30, 2001 2:25PM

Hi
I'm new to the list, so hello everyone.
One problem commonly seen when drop-down select boxes are used for
navigation is that the page author has relied on a JavaScript event to
trigger the navigation. For users without JavaScript, there's no way of
triggering the navigation - you change the option and nothing happens. So,
yes, there should be a "go" button - it's needed to submit the chosen option
for users without JavaScript.
> without the "go" button, the first link down in the list is the one that
is selected
If you're using IE, you can select *any* item from the options by tabbing to
the drop-down box, then pressing Alt-DownArrow, then UpArrow or DownArrow to
move up and down the options, followed by Enter/Return to finalize the
selection. The problem with this is that you probably can't rely on users
doing this - they're possibly more likely to tab to the control and use the
up/down keys as you describe.
Another problem with using drop-down select boxes (or HTML form controls of
any kind) is that the text associated with them can't be resized (which is
surprising after so many generations of browser development). If you can
design a navigation menu in DHTML which also works without JavaScript, then
at least you have the advantage of having resizable fonts.
John Farrie
Accessibility by Design
"Design for accessibility and everyone can benefit"
http://accessibilitybydesign.co.uk