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RE: Help with adding ACCESSKEY statements?

for

From: Keith Patton
Date: Feb 20, 2004 4:53AM

Hi,
I would take issue a little with advice never to use access keys (although i
admit conflicts are possible), as long as a standard is developed and
followed, this should minimise conflict with screen reader access. The UK
government for example has established such reserved keys for it's sites via
http://www.e-envoy.gov.uk/Resources/WebHandbookIndex1Article/fs/en?CONTENT_I
D=4000092&chk=XHiT3L which we are aiming to follow.

Also, make sure the link to information on accessing your site (which would
include information on tab indexes and any access keys in use) is made
prominent on the site near the top, and also provide tab indexing on the
links using the tabindex attribute to allow keyboard users to easily get to
the link if it is not near the top of the page in terms of number of tabs.

Keith
www.ethicalmedia.com


-----Original Message-----
From: Jukka K. Korpela [mailto: <EMAIL REMOVED> ]
Sent: 20 February 2004 11:13
To: <EMAIL REMOVED>
Subject: Re: Help with adding ACCESSKEY statements?


On Fri, 20 Feb 2004, Jean-Michel Brevelle wrote:

> I'm trying to add accesskey definitions to navigational links on a new web
> site. It's my first attempt and I'm not doing so well with it.

Just don't do it. It's extra burden to you, it complicates the markup
somewhat, and it does not improve accessibility - rather the opposite.
In special cases authors might use the accesskey attribute, but they
should really know what they are doing, and probably do it in closed
circles (such as intranets where users can be educated) only.

Most importantly, accesskey attributes mess up _built-in_ accessibility
features in user agents. For some details, check
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/forms/accesskey.html

> I think the problem is a conflict between the accesskey statement and the
> class definition

No, accesskey attributes and class attributes are not coupled in any way.

> -- the links are coded in javascript to highlight on
> mouseover --

It's useful to people using graphic browsers to highlight a link on
mouseover, but it's unnecessary to use JavaScript for it. CSS works fine.
Any use JavaScript makes some people suspicious, and that's good -
Paranoia is good, as the User's Security Handbook says.

> Here is a sample statement:<a href="Default.htm" title="Return to this
web's
> Home Page" class="inactive" highlight>Home</a>

I don't see any accesskey attribute there, or any attribute that would
call JavaScript on mouseover. (Whether the title attribute is useful is
another thing. What's the point? If you are telling such things, telling
what "this web" is would probably be more useful.)

What does the highlight attribute mean? It's surely nonstandard, but which
browsers recognize it, and what do they do with it
> Can anyone help me out with this? If you want to review the rest of the
> script, just ask and I'll send it.

What script? I think you should just post the URL if you need help with a
particular page. But I don't think you should create more problems by
using accesskey.

--
Jukka "Yucca" Korpela, http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/


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