Accessibility, Keyboard Navigation and macOS: required preferences are gone, default behavior is weird
As I've checked, there was and option in Settings called "Full Keyboard Access", where we could choose "All controls".
By default, Firefox on macOS can focus on "some" controls (as I've checked: buttons, popup menus, inputs), BUT somehow not even links! Why no links ("a" HTML tag)?
I totally don't understand this decision, so let's check it out step by step:
1. Default behavior specifically for macOS. Somehow I can understand it because of Safari, but still: Safari has to hotkeys for navigation and a toggle, by default user still can navigate to any next focusable control via Option+Tab. In Firefox, there is no such hotkey (or I didn't find it).
2. Where is even a sense in behavior like this by default? Most of websites have regular links on a page, so user may use keyboard to navigate only form controls, but not the whole page (navigation menu etc).
3. Where is this option now? Why I didn't find "Full Keyboard Access" in a hotkey list even if it actually works? How user (with or without disabilities) can know there is one?
4. I've tried the only related preference I could find: "Always use the cursor keys to navigate within pages", but it didn't help with anything at all.
Всички отговори (4)
Please provide a screen shot of each as not sure what you would like : Note it is a little quirky at times uploading. https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-do-i-create-screenshot-my-problem
Hi Dmytro, I use Windows, so let me describe my experience first.
When the cursor is in a document, pressing the Tab key will move among form controls and links. Links get the dotted square outline. This doesn't require Caret Browsing to be enabled, but if it is, a vertical bar will appear at the start of the link in addition to the dotted outline.
On Mac, it sounds as though you're saying a plain Tab or an option-Tab visits the form controls but skips over the links.
There actually is a setting to skip links, so please check that first:
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful or accepting the risk.
(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste tabfo and pause while the list is filtered
(3) Do you see a preference named accessibility.tabfocus? (Note: not referring to a separate one called accessibility.tabfocus_applies_to_xul, it's just accessibility.tabfocus)
- No: Firefox on Mac should follow the Full Keyboard Access system preference.
- Yes: This setting will override the default behavior.
- To remove the custom preference, right-click (Ctrl+click on a one-button mouse) > Reset the preference. When you close about:config and repeat steps (1) and (2), it should be gone.
- Alternately, to specify the behavior, you can set the value to one of the following (other combinations are possible but not very logical):
- 7 => text controls and other form controls, AND links
This is the default setting on Windows - 3 => text controls and other form controls, but NOT links
- 1 => only text controls (mine acts like 3 if I try this)
- 7 => text controls and other form controls, AND links
(4) If you want to create the override preference yourself to see whether that helps:
(A) Select and copy the preference name:
accessibility.tabfocus
(B) Right-click (or Ctrl+click) a blank area of the about:config screen and choose New > Integer
(C) Firefox should display a small box where you can paste the name of the new preference, then click OK.
(D) Next, Firefox should request the value of the preference. Type 7 and click OK.
Променено на от jscher2000 - Support Volunteer
What I mean is: in Firefox for macOS BY DEFAULT it skips everything except form controls. For example, I open google.com and with Tab pressed can only navigate search field and 2 buttons, can't navigate to navigation menu at the top, can't open links (because they get no focus) etc.
Note: my concern is this behavior is by default only for macOS, on Windows Firefox works as expected.
And please read my message carefully: I say that similar behavior is in Safari by default, BUT Safari has Option+Tab hotkey for regular navigation which doesn't skip anything, Firefox doesn't have even that.
Also, I do not use/talking about nerdy about:config, I'm speaking about user friendly Setting where user can get from application menus.
Main complaint: there is a hotkey Ctrl+F7, which toggles this behavior (basically, to make Firefox use Tab as like for Windows/Linux users). But there is no description on this hotkey in manuals, no option for this in user friendly Settings.
Why even macOS user wants to have this by default for a non-proprietary browser? For example, most of the users install Firefox on Mac only because they used it on Windows or Linux, have synced data there etc — so, why change this behavior? Chrome doesn't have that. Opera also doesn't. They work the same on all available OS.
Dmytro said
Main complaint: there is a hotkey Ctrl+F7, which toggles this behavior (basically, to make Firefox use Tab as like for Windows/Linux users). But there is no description on this hotkey in manuals, no option for this in user friendly Settings.
Why even macOS user wants to have this by default for a non-proprietary browser? For example, most of the users install Firefox on Mac only because they used it on Windows or Linux, have synced data there etc — so, why change this behavior? Chrome doesn't have that. Opera also doesn't. They work the same on all available OS.
Firefox on Mac is designed to follow the system-level "Full Keyboard Access" setting. Why is this the default on Mac instead of operating like Windows and Linux? I don't know.
Control+F7 is a system level shortcut, as mentioned in the article/screenshot here: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204434#fullkeyboard.
If the Control+F7 shortcut works to switch between Tab selecting form controls only and form controls + links, it sounds like your Firefox is following the current "Full Keyboard Access" setting as expected.
If you want to suggest that Firefox not follow the "Full Keyboard Access" setting and instead operate consistently on Windows, Mac, and Linux, or that a section should be added to Firefox's Preferences page, you could use one or more of the following (depending on whether you want a suggestion box or a discussion):
- Feedback: https://qsurvey.mozilla.com/s3/FirefoxInput/
- Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/firefox/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/firefox
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Firefox