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GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

ckardaris.com

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Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#431

Post by frumiousirc »

globular-toast wrote: post #196

This was my point in my comment[0] in that thread. I've used GUI Emacs for years, it's way better than the TUI version and fully keyboard driven. Interestingly, people have seen my GUI Emacs and commented "I didn't know you could get images in a terminal". Then I have to tell them it's not a terminal... If I had to pick the absolute worst things about Teams, which is already one of the worst pieces of software ever m…

> Interestingly, people have seen my GUI Emacs and commented "I didn't know you could get images in a terminal". Then I have to tell them it's not a terminal...

...[finishing with], though you *can* also display images in a terminal, including in Emacs running in a terminal.

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#432

Post by [deleted] »

miki123211 wrote: post #375
Xirdus wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> accessibility is just usability. all it is is making sure your product is as usable by as many people as possible. Not always. There are things that increase usability for fully abled people but decrease it for disabled people. Color-coding is a common one. Another is using smaller font size to make more info visible at once, or advanced touch gestures that can be accidentally triggered by shaky hands. Then there a…

Color coding doesn't decrease usability for disabled people (and I say that as a screen reader user). You just need to ensure that color is not the only way the relevant information is conveyed.

[deleted]

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#433

Post by ckardaris »

Xirdus wrote: post #428
ckardaris wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you can — or should be able to — independently toggle all of those features. For example, the app should work in high-contrast mode with disabled color coding, it should work with touch gestures disabled, etc. A good common framework helps here. Then, it's up to each user to set their settings properly.

Riddle me this - why would you want to disable something that increases usability of an application? (Yes, this is a loaded question - I never said these features are bad, just that usability and accessibility are sometimes at odds with each other.)

Sometimes users may prefer to reduce the degree of accessibility of an application in favor of aesthetics.

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#434

Post by reamaer »

manlymuppet wrote: post #56

Power user experience is not the same thing as user experience in general. If you want to make the argument that all developer tooling should be keyboard-driven, fine, be my guest. But most people aren't willing to deal with the learning curve of keyboard-driven GUIs, and that's okay. We shouldn't force it. HN's insistence on acting like all users are Arch Linux efficiency perfectionist hacker types is painfully corn…

Whoa there.

Allowing people to use keyboard is NOT the same as forcing people to use keyboard.

Also, very few users will use only the keyboard, but quite many will use some part of keyboard access. If today I need to switch between proofreading languages a lot, you bet I will learn the keyboard shortcut for it (and forget day after that, until next time I needit again)

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#435

Post by WhyNotHugo »

gramie wrote: post #177
rootedbox wrote: post #152

I work on ADA a lot for my company. Please put on some headphones, turn on the voice assistant of your OS, put on some blinders, and run your app or website… no mouse, just keyboard. 1. Democracy is about access; make sure everyone has access to your software. 2. The keyboard allows folks with disabilities and power users to fly through your website/app… that being said… the second a tab is off, the person with a dis…

I had to keep accessibility in mind a lot in my previous job (web development for a university). The thing that I consistently found was that, the more accessible a website was, the better the experience for everyone , not just people with disabilities.

This is true in other fields too. Wheel-chair ramps are used by people with baby strollers. Subtitles work for deaf people, those who can't understand the spoken language, or simple folks in situations where someone is sleeping next to them. Pretty much every accessibility-oriented feature ends up helping out people beyond the original audience.

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#436

Post by bryanrasmussen »

the fully keyboard driven website is difficult to achieve, in some part because of accessibility tools, first off every OS has their own hotkeys and keyboard shortcuts, generally with some explicit modifier, the reason for modifiers is that it is good to have a key you push in coordination with some other key to force something to happen outside the functionality of whatever thing you are currently interacting with.

Second browsers often have their own hotkey combinations. Same things apply.

Third screenreaders have their own hotkey combinations that make the screenreader do something.

fourth parts of your site probably have their own specific functionality for key presses, like this text box I am writing in right now.

fifth people with accessibility issues and just anybody with some technical needs or abilities may have set their own global hotkeys in their particular OS.

sixth some keyboards might not have the keys you think of as really clever modifier keys.

So, if you really wanted to get around problems of potential hotkey collisions you should provide a default hotkey set that users can edit and override , and that is why I always get accused of over-complicating everything I do.

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#438

Post by Xirdus »

ckardaris wrote: post #433
Xirdus wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Riddle me this - why would you want to disable something that increases usability of an application? (Yes, this is a loaded question - I never said these features are bad, just that usability and accessibility are sometimes at odds with each other.)

Sometimes users may prefer to reduce the degree of accessibility of an application in favor of aesthetics.

I have my opinion on aesthetics of additional ways of repeating information already available by color coding. But to each their own.

Other than that, is enabling/disabling any of the aforementioned features ever a question of aesthetics?

Re: GUIs should be fully keyboard-driven

#440

Post by ckardaris »

Xirdus wrote: post #438
ckardaris wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes users may prefer to reduce the degree of accessibility of an application in favor of aesthetics.

I have my opinion on aesthetics of additional ways of repeating information already available by color coding. But to each their own. Other than that, is enabling/disabling any of the aforementioned features ever a question of aesthetics?

For example, opting to not enable high-contrast mode is a question of aesthetics. Arguably reading text would become easier for the user, but they prefer to sacrifice a little of the readability in favor of looks.
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