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Re: WCAG and incorrect implementation of keyboard interaction

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From: Patrick H. Lauke
Date: Mar 13, 2019 5:35AM

On 13/03/2019 11:20, konstantin galiakhmetov wrote:
> hello,
> What SC i can mention when i see that a keyboard interaction with a ui
> control is implemented in the wrong way.
> For example there is a drobdown list  and a user has to press tab key to
> move to the next item. My user experience says that i must use arrowkey
> to choose an option in the drop-down list, not tab key, and i am sure
> that this implementation is not correct, but i can not cite a particular
> SC  because WCAG does not regulate specific implementation.

You are correct that you can't normatively fail this particular issue
under any WCAG SC. Even SC 2.1.1 Keyboard only normatively requires that
content be operable with the keyboard, not that it necessarily follow
any specific or appropriate conventions.

> What should
> I do in such cases? How can I prove that this implementation is a major
> problem? Or I'm wrong and above described behavior is not critical issue?

If the authors/developers only care about whether or not it passes WCAG
SCs as the only "proof", then ... there's nothing you can do.

Of course, accessibility (and to a certain extent, usability) goes
beyond the bare minimum baseline of WCAG. Generally, in an audit
situation, I'd mention this sort of mismatch/less than appropriate
keyboard behaviour by saying that yes, while it does pass 2.1.1, it
should really be addressed to match user expectations.

Also, it's not clear from your original message, but: how is this
"dropdown list" exposed programmatically? If it's exposed (and therefore
announced by assistive technologies) as a particular type of widget,
then it should ideally follow that widget's standard behaviour, or AT
users will be even more confused (or, in the worst case, will be unable
to interact with the widget correctly at all, since AT will then assume
only certain keyboard interactions are possible/acceptable on that
particular widget).

P
--
Patrick H. Lauke

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