Keyboard accessible
Normative Text
All content that can be accessed by other input modalities can be accessed using keyboard interface only.
All content includes content made available via hovers, right clicks, etc.
Other input modalities include pointing devices, voice and speech recognition, gesture, camera, and any other means of input or control.
The “Keyboard operable” requirement allows you to navigate to all actionable elements, but if the next element is 5 screens down, you also need to be able to access all the content. Also, if the content is in expanding sections, you need to not only open them but also access all of the content, not just its actionable elements.
Tests
This section is non-normative.
Procedure For all content on the page/view:
- Check that the content can be viewed using the keyboard and keyboard actions in the Standard Keyboard Navigation & Operation Keys and Techniques;
- Check that the content can be viewed using keyboard actions described on the page where it is required or on a page earlier in the process where it is required.
Expected results
- #1 or 2 is true.
Tests
This content needs to be written.
Key Terms
- actively available
available for the user to perceive and use
- conformance scope
A set of Views and/or Pages selected to be part of a conformance claim. Where a View or Page is part of a Process, all the Views or Pages in the process must be included.
How a person or organization selects the set is not defined in WCAG3. There maybe informative guidance on selecting a suitable set in future (similar to WCAG-EM), but regional laws or regulations may provide a methodology.
- content
information, sensory experience and interactions conveyed
- gesture
motion made by the body or a body part used to communicate to technology
- keyboard interface
API (Application Programming Interface) where software gets “keystrokes” from
“Keystrokes” that are passed to the software from the “keyboard interface” may come from a wide variety of sources including but not limited to a scanning program, sip-and-puff morse code software, speech recognition software, AI of all sorts, as well as other keyboard substitutes or special keyboards.
- page
non-embedded resource obtained from a single URI using HTTP plus any other resources that are used in the rendering or intended to be rendered together
Where a URI is available and represents a unique set of content, that would be the preferred conformance unit.
- platform
software, or collection of layers of software, that lies below the subject software and provides services to the subject software and that allows the subject software to be isolated from the hardware, drivers, and other software below
Platform software both makes it easier for subject software to run on different hardware, and provides the subject software with many services (e.g. functions, utilities, libraries) that make the subject software easier to write, keep updated, and work more uniformly with other subject software.
A particular software component might play the role of a platform in some situations and a client in others. For example a browser is a platform for the content of the page but it also relies on the operating system below it.
The platform is the context in which the conformance scope exists.
- pointer
a hardware-agnostic representation of input devices that can target a specific coordinate (or set of coordinates) on a screen, such as a mouse, pen, or touch contact
- process
series of views or pages associated with user actions, where actions required to complete an activity are performed, often in a certain order, regardless of the technologies used or whether it spans different sites or domains
- section
self-contained portion of content that deals with one or more related topics or thoughts
A section may consist of one or more paragraphs and include graphics, tables, lists and sub-sections.
- view
content that is actively available in a viewport including that which can be scrolled or panned to, and any additional content that is included by expansion while leaving the rest of the content in the viewport actively available
A modal dialog box would constitute a new view because the other content in the viewport is no longer actively available.
- viewport
object in which the platform presents content
The author has no control of the viewport and almost always has no idea what is presented in a viewport (e.g. what is on screen) because it is provided by the platform. On browsers the hardware platform is isolated from the content.
Content can be presented through one or more viewports. Viewports include windows, frames, loudspeakers, and virtual magnifying glasses. A viewport may contain another viewport. For example, nested frames. Interface components created by the user agent such as prompts, menus, and alerts are not viewports.