Accesskey Standard

Correct usage of keyboard shortcuts

[waldemar]

I read, one should use only numbers since some browsers (opera?) may use letters for internal functions already:

1 Homepage (other page)
2 Skip to content (same page)
3 Sitemap (other page)
9 Contact (other page)

Now I have 4-8 and 0 left for other links; what to do when I have more menu entries?

[BlobFisk]

Hey waldemar,

There is no hard and fast rules for this that I know of. You can use whatever you like! However, I would avoid using the following reserved keys:

Reserved Keys in IE 5.5/6
F – File
E – Edit
V – View
A – Favorites
T – Tools
D – Address
H – Help

Reserved Keys in NS 7
F – File
E – Edit
V – View
G – Go
B – Bookmarks
T – Tools
H – Help
W – Window

Reserved Keys in Opera 7
F – File
E – Edit
V – View
N – Navigate
B – Bookmark
M – Mail
W – Window
H – Help

Which still leaves you with a good number of options. As long as you have outlined what accesskeys you are using (on your accessibility page).

[waldemar]

So using letters is ok?!... I will end up in a strange mixture between numbers and letters then?!

Do you have a "personal" recommendation? Or just stick to the first letter? Should I underline the accesskey?

accessibility page

Another thing I couldn't find any hints about yet. What should this page contain? Where in the hierarchy is it? (same level as contact/sitemap/?)

[BlobFisk]

I personally tend to stick to numbers and don't assign accesskeys to every navigational element.

As for the accessibility page, it should contain the list of accesskeys and what they do and how to use them (for different browsers). Maybe a paragraph on the standards complaince of your site and it's accessibility features (longdesc, rel links etc.).

I tend to keep the Accessibility Statement link on my top nav and prevelant throughout the site.

[Trisha]

There was a big discussion about the use of access keys some time ago on the W3C accessibility mailing list. If I remember correctly, what most people eventually decided was that it may not be a good idea to use them anymore at all. Basically every key is already being used by some assistive technology software, or some other software. So matter what ones you choose not everyone would be able to use them. This was about 3-6 months ago.

I haven't been subscribed to that mailing list for a while now because I ended up getting kicked off when my web site was down for a while and I guess emails sent to me using my domain got returned and I was taken off the list. I just haven't had time to re-subscribe yet - there's always a possiblity that more recent discussions on that list came to different conclusions.

[waldemar]

Now that turns everything around... there has no official w3c recommendation grown out of this?

[ukgimp]

>>reserved keys

Blobfisk is right, numbers every time. You are safe with numbers. Of course you will need to state your keys in your accessibility statement, which should be easy to get to :)