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Navigation Strategy

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From: Singh, Manik
Date: Jan 22, 2002 10:28AM

Hello,
I have a question regarding the general navigation strategy for web based
applications with JAWS:
or normal web sites, the virtual pc cursor (arrow key navigation for the
whole page and tab key navigation for interactive elements) works fine. But,
for web applications which have a very fat front end and a lot of UI
elements on screens, this does not work as well (since the users have to
switch between cursors a lot). So, in the case of web application, is it a
good idea to have everything on the screen (including descriptive text) be
tabbed to with the virtual pc cursor turned off?. This would mean including
all the elements on the screen, including text, in the TABINDEX.
I haven't done any end user testing with this navigation strategy and wanted
an outside opinion on the issue. The clear advantage of the "All Tab"
strategy is that it requires minimal training and there is no switching of
cursors for navigation (this will be faster and will induce less mental
workload for the users). The disadvantage is that this strategy is not
consistent with how visually impaired users navigate web based material.
I'll greatly appreciate any feedback on this issue.
Regards,
Manik.


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