Keyboard Interface: List which operable elements (should) respond to SPACE, and which to ENTER

[brennanyoung]

The default "Space to scroll" behavior sometimes comes as a surprise when a hyperlink is in focus, especially to developers who have limited experience with keyboard interaction, but this is not mentioned in the link practice doc.

Similarly it's far from obvious that radio buttons and switches aren't necessarily expected to respond to Enter, although this behavior at least is mentioned as "optional" in the radio button and switch docs. (Are there other outliers?)

I'm not going to get into whether responding to either or both keys is right or wrong. I'm calling for any differences in default activation key to be documented clearly in the page about keyboard operation. There's a lot of info about focus (which is great), but almost nothing about activation.

Can we please add this info in an at-a-glance form (e.g. brief list or table) to https://www.w3.org/WAI/ARIA/apg/practices/keyboard-interface/ which is likely to be where people will look for such info.

[jnurthen]

@brennanyoung This sounds like the correct location for such information. If you would like to see this, a PR to add it would move the process much quicker.

[css-meeting-bot]

The ARIA Authoring Practices (APG) Task Force just discussed Keyboard Interface: List which operable elements (should) respond to SPACE, and which to ENTER #2447.

The full IRC log of that discussion

<MarkMcCarthy> TOPIC: Keyboard Interface: List which operable elements (should) respond to SPACE, and which to ENTER #2447
<MarkMcCarthy> github: https://github.com//issues/2447
<MarkMcCarthy> Matt_King: when enter or space does something, it is there?
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: i think he's talking about having it all in one place, rather than each example showing one, both, or none.
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: could be a section in activation behavior, explain the defaults on each platform
<MarkMcCarthy> Matt_King: space doesn't activate links?
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: no, but it does on buttons. Melanie filed an issue about it, that space should activate an anchor element, since that all can be confusing to a sighted user
<MarkMcCarthy> Matt_King: would this be better suited to HTML?
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: if you're creating an aria widget, not an HTML one, then where do you put the information for what they keystrokes should respond to?
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: ultimately - this issue is asking for what -current- behaviors are and to have it documented in one place.
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: that's something that a PR could be easily made for
<MarkMcCarthy> jamesn: i'll add a comment

[brennanyoung]

Re: the log: Yes it is indeed about having this info all in one place. Thank you!