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Thread: Access Keys
Number of posts in this thread: 8 (In chronological order)
From: Geof Collis
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 11:48AM
Subject: Access Keys
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Hi All
I read the statement below on a website and wondered what the
International recommendations for access keys are?
This site uses a setup that closely matches most international
recommendations on access keys.
cheers
Geof
Administrator
Coalition of Ontario Accessibility Advisory Committees (COAAC) Website
www.coaac.ca
Follow COAAC on Twitter
www.twitter.com/coaac
From: DAVOUD TOHIDY
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 2:45PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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> I read the statement below on a website and wondered what the
>
International recommendations for access keys are?
Hi Geof,
Access keys should be used carefully to prevent any conflict with
the
browser and or assisstive technology's short cut keys.
add the following to wats dot ca "/show.php?contentid=32"
and
"/show.php?contentid=43" and read some good articles.
I am not a big fan of access keys even though I understand
that it would
help some disabled users. However implementation
of the access keys
need a broad research to prevent accessibility
problems it may cause to
other users.
Davoud
>
From: Jukka K. Korpela
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 3:03PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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Geof Collis wrote:
> I read the statement below on a website and wondered what the
> International recommendations for access keys are?
>
> This site uses a setup that closely matches most international
> recommendations on access keys.
It seems to be widespread phrase. Googling with it typically leads to pages
like
http://www.fian.org/accessibility-info
with huge accessibility problems (e.g., grossly inadequate contrast between
some texts and background).
Pages with that phrase do not cite any references. Lack of references for
such claims typically means there are no good references to cite.
The WebAIM site used to have accesskey assignments, but I don't think it has
them any more - rather, it has articles that present criticism against the
idea or implementations, e.g.
http://www.webaim.org/techniques/keyboard/accesskey.php
That article mentions:
"Both the United Kingdom (UK) and Canadian governments created a
standardized set of accesskey shortcuts. The Canadian government eventually
abandoned theirs, though (see the current Canadian government
recommendation - external link), due to the many implementation issues
already discussed. The UK continues to support its original list of standard
shortcuts, which are as follows:"
The list contains by assignments for "S" (questionable, since
>
>
> cheers
>
> Geof
>
> Administrator
> Coalition of Ontario Accessibility Advisory Committees (COAAC) Website
> www.coaac.ca
> Follow COAAC on Twitter
> www.twitter.com/coaac
>
>
From: Geof Collis
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 3:39PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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Hi Davoud
I have no use for them either and just wondered where such a
recommendation existed because of all the negative things I have read.
cheers
Geof
At 03:35 PM 5/21/2010, you wrote:
> > I read the statement below on a website and wondered what the
> >
> International recommendations for access keys are?
>
>Hi Geof,
>
>Access keys should be used carefully to prevent any conflict with
>the
>browser and or assisstive technology's short cut keys.
>
>add the following to wats dot ca "/show.php?contentid=32"
>and
>"/show.php?contentid=43" and read some good articles.
>
>I am not a big fan of access keys even though I understand
>that it would
> help some disabled users. However implementation
>of the access keys
>need a broad research to prevent accessibility
>problems it may cause to
>other users.
>
>Davoud
>
>
> >
From: Geof Collis
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 3:45PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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Hi Jukka
It is actually a part of the Plome CMS as I have seen it on a number
of sites now.
cheers
Geof
At 04:02 PM 5/21/2010, you wrote:
>Geof Collis wrote:
>
> > I read the statement below on a website and wondered what the
> > International recommendations for access keys are?
> >
> > This site uses a setup that closely matches most international
> > recommendations on access keys.
>
>It seems to be widespread phrase. Googling with it typically leads to pages
>like
>http://www.fian.org/accessibility-info
>with huge accessibility problems (e.g., grossly inadequate contrast between
>some texts and background).
>
>Pages with that phrase do not cite any references. Lack of references for
>such claims typically means there are no good references to cite.
>
>The WebAIM site used to have accesskey assignments, but I don't think it has
>them any more - rather, it has articles that present criticism against the
>idea or implementations, e.g.
> http://www.webaim.org/techniques/keyboard/accesskey.php
>That article mentions:
>
>"Both the United Kingdom (UK) and Canadian governments created a
>standardized set of accesskey shortcuts. The Canadian government eventually
>abandoned theirs, though (see the current Canadian government
>recommendation - external link), due to the many implementation issues
>already discussed. The UK continues to support its original list of standard
>shortcuts, which are as follows:"
>
>The list contains by assignments for "S" (questionable, since
>
> >
> >
> > cheers
> >
> > Geof
> >
> > Administrator
> > Coalition of Ontario Accessibility Advisory Committees (COAAC) Website
> > www.coaac.ca
> > Follow COAAC on Twitter
> > www.twitter.com/coaac
> >
> >
From: DAVOUD TOHIDY
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 4:30PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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> I have no use for them either and just wondered where such a
> recommendation existed because of all the negative things I have read.
If I am not mistaking it originated from UK Government. Then followed by Canadian Government however after the wats.ca articles then Canadian government as Jukka mentioned removed recommendation for using access keys.
Actually Jukka was humble not to refer you to his article at (add the www. to the following):
cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/forms/accesskey.html
davoud
P.S. : I think my messages are bring blocked when I use a url that is why I don't provide the full Url sorry.
>
From: Geof Collis
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 4:54PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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Thanks, I'll bookmark it, I had one bookmarked from Nomensa but the
Url no longer works.
At 05:24 PM 5/21/2010, you wrote:
> > I have no use for them either and just wondered where such a
> > recommendation existed because of all the negative things I have read.
>
>
>If I am not mistaking it originated from UK Government. Then
>followed by Canadian Government however after the wats.ca articles
>then Canadian government as Jukka mentioned removed recommendation
>for using access keys.
>
>Actually Jukka was humble not to refer you to his article at (add
>the www. to the following):
>
>cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/forms/accesskey.html
>
>davoud
>P.S. : I think my messages are bring blocked when I use a url that
>is why I don't provide the full Url sorry.
>
>
> >
From: John Foliot
Date: Fri, May 21 2010 7:12PM
Subject: Re: Access Keys
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DAVOUD TOHIDY wrote:
>
>> I have no use for them either and just wondered where such a
>> recommendation existed because of all the negative things I have read.
>
> If I am not mistaking it originated from UK Government. Then followed by
> Canadian Government however after the wats.ca articles then Canadian
> government as Jukka mentioned removed recommendation for using access
> keys.
Actually Davoud, the Canadian Government originally adopted Accesskeys
prior to the UK government as they were first recommended in WCAG1, and it
was our research at WATS.ca (we were doing a fair bit of consulting work
to the Canadian government at the time) which ultimately convinced them to
abandon them due to conflicts with Adaptive Technology. I also spent a
fair bit of time in the early 2000's writing and speaking about the issues
around accesskeys, which saw traction and thus they were not taken up that
much.
Accesskeys *could* be useful were it not for implementation issues, both
w.r.t. conflicts with AT, but also issues of internationalization and
discoverability. My good friend (and a good friend of accessibility going
back over a decade) Chaals (a.k.a. Charles McCathieNevile - CSO at Opera)
has a proposal which needs finalization for HTML5, which would resurrect
Acccesskeys by insisting on a common browser means to query if a page has
accesskeys, as well as offering a means to re-map or otherwise interact
with those 'shortcuts', as this is what they are - shortcuts to inter-page
navigation. At the same time however, reliance on these types of
mechanisms will likely also have 'competition' from the new HTML5 landmark
elements, which will allow for users to also navigate from identified
region to region (certainly this will be significantly easier in
screen-reading technology, but might require some additional configuration
in the user-agents [browsers] to extend to other users - perhaps something
like a Firefox plug-in).
All things being equal in 2010, I still recommend authors avoid using
accesskeys.
Cheers!
JF