What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

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Ulysses
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What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

Post by Ulysses »

I have looked around to see what the Tab Index" & "Access Key" fields are for, but can't figure it out.

On the User Handbook http://wiki.cmsmadesimple.org/index.php ... /Edit_Page there is no info about these.

Anyone know what they are for?

Thanks
Last edited by reneh on Sat May 23, 2009 10:17 pm, edited 1 time in total.
girlnerd
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Re: What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

Post by girlnerd »

They're for accessibility - for your readers who have a disability.

Tab Index is useful for when you create a page in CSS and want the links to be tabbed through a logical order. Not so important if you've laid out your page as it is meant to be tabbed through. A person who could not use a mouse due to a spinal cord injury or neurological disability would use the tab key to move through the links.

Access keys are assigned letters to a frequently used link or form element. For example, you may assign the letter "s" to the search box. Then a person using a keyboard or someone who is blind (and would also use only the keyboard) would only need to press Control + S to jump to the search box. Another frequently used access key would be for home where you'd assign for example either the number 1 or h - then Control + 1 would bring the user back to the home page.
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kermit
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Re: What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

Post by kermit »

note that the 'trigger' or method used for access keys varies from browser to browser.

in firefox 2 on windows, for instance, it's now shift+alt+accesskey, instead of just alt+accesskey. this was to remove the conflict with the program's internal keyboard shortcuts.. which is a problem many browsers have with accesskeys: accesskeys on web pages override the browser's own shortcuts. further reading: http://juicystudio.com/article/firefox2-accesskeys.php and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accesskeys
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Ulysses
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Re: What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

Post by Ulysses »

WOW! I've been in web publishing since '95 and it never occured to me to optimise a site for less-abled people.  :-[

I'm impressed, and will learn how to do this and enable all appropriate sites in future. But then again, what's not appropriate! Every site should be optimised for this.

Thanks girlnerd and kermit
Duketown

Re: What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

Post by Duketown »

Just a consideration on the usage of shortcut keys in combination with the Google Chrome Browser:
Ctrl + 1 gives the first tab. If you have more then one open, they can be directly accessed using Ctrl+2, Ctrl+3 etc.
Also letters are in use with the Ctrl key. This as a tip/warning.
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Re: What's a "Tab Index" & "Access Key" for?

Post by AlasdairGF »

Ulysses wrote: WOW! I've been in web publishing since '95 and it never occured to me to optimise a site for less-abled people.  :-[

I'm impressed, and will learn how to do this and enable all appropriate sites in future. But then again, what's not appropriate! Every site should be optimised for this.
I know this post is a couple of years old, but I guess most people are in the same boat, never having considered accessibility issues.  Remember that many countries have legislation that requires some websites to be accessible to various user groups (visual or other impairments, physical disabilities and even cognitive impairment in some cases).  It's worth checking out - see the W3C's policy page to check the situation in your country.  For how to do it, google "web design accessibility" or similar, or check out the W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative.

While I think everyone should consider these at least a little, you should def think about this if you're running a govt/local authority site, charity site or any form of educational site (which will probably have additional legislation such as the UK's Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001). 

Essentially a case can be made that anyone who provides "goods or services" should ensure they are not discriminating against any one user group.

I enjoyed finding out about this stuff - but then I'm one of those who's always soaking up more info.  Jack of all trades, master of none, that's me.  For instance, check out http://colorfilter.wickline.org/ to see a colour-blindness simulator, easy way to find out how some of your users actually see your site!

Using a CMS such as CMSMS should mean that much accessibility work is already done for you, but don't just assume that - and there's a lot of other stuff that template designers & web authors need to consider than no CMS can do for you.
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