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Tabindex and skip links...

for

From: Stephanie Sullivan
Date: Sep 23, 2003 9:10PM

Hi all. I have not been on this list long so I apologize if this has already
been discussed ad infinitum.

I have a site that will be going live next week. It is a 'mildly accessible'
site with inline UL for most navigation, uses CSS with one overall table for
the three columns (not the header of footer), XHTML Transitional.

We have used tabindexes to take the user from each nav button to their
respective subnav group in order... Then on to the sign in and search forms.
All this is working swimmingly.

Here's my issue.

We also created four visible skip links (we opted not to use display:none)
which are the first four tabindexes for each page. These go to the log in
form, the main content, the list of that day's new content and the search
box. HOWEVER, what I've found is that though the user can tab to the skip
link that takes them to the search box -- once they click on the skip link
and actually jump to the anchor in the search form -- when they hit tab
again to get INTO the text field to search, they pop back over to the next
tab index... Not the form field.

I've tried several workarounds. Some were likely not too kosher. But I can't
get anything to work. <sigh />

So is this an "either/or" situation? Can I not have a tabindex AND skip
links? Does anyone have an idea for a solution?

TIA,

Stephanie Sullivan

Contributing Author .: "Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 Magic" :. New Riders
CommunityMX Team Member :: http://www.communitymx.com
Technical Editor .: "DreamweaverMX Killer Tips" :. New Riders
VioletSky Design :: http://www.violetsky.net

You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing we call
failure is not the falling down, but the staying down. - Mary Pickford



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