Which keyCodes kan I safely use to make my website accessible?

Question

Hi,

update: Got a beautiful app with exclusive shortcuts for every view, all javascript. I'm gonna look into Fogbugz, i like the hovering shortcut-codes, thanks for the reference.

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i want to make my site accessible and more usable for visitors. Which keyCodes can I safely use to handle certain javascript actions?

With safely I mean:

• keyCodes that don't interrupt with default browser actions
  • No direct functionality (like pressing F1 for Help)
  • No indirect functionality (like pressing CTRL+C for Copy)

Or should I prevent default actions from executing?

Answer 1

Maybe you should take a look at those questions:

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/912018/key-shortcuts-in-web-application http://stackoverflow.com/questions/362727/building-a-keyboard-accessible-web-application

Answer 2

Just stick to letters and numbers.

Here is a link to the shortcuts gmail uses for example:- http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en-uk&answer=6594

Just make sure you don't interfere with people typing into form fields.

Answer 3

What accessibility do you want to achieve?

Accessibility software like will have their own key-actions.

Different browsers have their own key-actions.

Some are even customisable.

I think you're asking for trouble whatever you do.

Edit: OK so somehow this wasn't clear. Here's what I was trying to say:

Browser's and accessibility software have an unlimited range of possibilities for what key combinations might be used. If you try to catch key-combinations, you will interfere with those somewhere along the line.

Sigh.

Answer 4

I personally avoid using these keycodes or AccessKeys for a public-facing site, as there is no way to know whether you are conflicting with some predefined shortcuts in users' software like screenreading software, etc.

Answer 5

This may be a tricky problem to solve over the long term, since browsers will sometimes introduce new keyboard shortcuts in newer versions, which may conflict with shortcuts that you may have assigned for use in your application. A couple of such examples that I'm aware of:

• An old version of the Google Toolbar that ran in Firefox 1 used the keystroke Alt+s to set the focus to the Search field on the toolbar. However, when Firefox 2 was introduced, the History menu was added with an accessor key of Alt+s, which broke the Google Toolbar Alt+s keyboard shortcut. (More info)

• An old version of the Firefox extension Duplicate Tab used the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Shift+t to duplicate the current tab. However, Firefox 2 introduced a new feature, "reopen recently closed tab," and assigned that to Ctrl+Shift+t, which broke Duplicate Tab. The author of Duplicate Tab ended up changing the "duplicate tab" shortcut key to Ctrl+Shift+u. (More info)

Answer 6

You'll also be happy to know about the existance of WCAG and WCAG 2.0 from W3 to help you with your accessibility mission.