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Re: Drop-down menus

for

From: Kynn Bartlett
Date: Aug 1, 2003 7:29PM


On Friday, August 1, 2003, at 05:18 AM, Joe Clark wrote:
>> (Jukka) Depends on what you mean by accessibility, but the practical
>> answer is "no, and there's no need to". Dropdown menus for navigation
>> are a bad idea.
>
> Drop-down menus created by styling unordered lists are a perfectly
> accessible and standards-compliant method. And that's not the only
> method, either.

A better question is whether or not they're a good idea. In a few
cases, they probably are. In most cases in which they're used, they're
not so good.

It's the same case as with frames. Frames aren't inherently evil, and
they CAN be made accessible, but the way in which most developers jump
on the bandwagon in a developer-centric attempt to solve developer
problems (at the expense of the overall usability) gives them a bad
rap. But not an undeserved one.

The same applies to drop-down menus. By and large, they're abused
rather than used, even if you can make them accessible (which you
can). Few people actually seem to use drop-down menus in a
responsible manner that benefits the user. Usually the impetus to
resort to a drop-down menu indicates some sort of OTHER problem,
either with layout/screen real estate, or with link organization
(and possibly site organization). Drop-down menus in such case
are often just a band-aid over larger problems, in the same way
that frames attempt to solve problems such as "I want to have all
these links on every page" (better solved by getting a better
authoring system than by using frames, EVEN if those frames will
be accessible).

> Jukka is great at sweeping condemnations, and they're always amusing
> to read, but he's out of date on this one.

Mmm, I disagree. (And yes, I've read about the lists + CSS stuff.)

--Kynn

--
Kynn Bartlett < <EMAIL REMOVED> > http://kynn.com
Chief Technologist, Idyll Mountain http://idyllmtn.com
Shock & Awe Blog http://shock-awe.info
Author, CSS in 24 Hours http://cssin24hours.com
Inland Anti-Empire Blog http://inlandantiempire.org



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