Closed Bug 1308726 Opened 8 years ago Closed 4 years ago

Alt+A does not work to access the menu Arkiv in Swedish version of Firefox 45.4.0

Categories

(Firefox :: Keyboard Navigation, defect)

Product:
Firefox
Component:
Keyboard Navigation
Version:
45 Branch
Platform:
x86
Linux
Type:
defect
Priority:
Not set
Severity:
normal

Tracking

()

Status:
RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 1376091

People

(Reporter: johanssongreppet, Unassigned)

Details

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:45.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/45.0
Build ID: 20160921204512

Steps to reproduce:

In the Swedish version of Mozilla Firefox 45.4.0 I pressed Alt+A trying to open the menu Arkiv.


Actual results:

Nothing happened.


Expected results:

The menu Arkiv should have been opened since "Arkiv" has A underlined.
Summary: Alt+A does not work to access the menu Arkiv in Swedish version of Mozilla 45.4.0 → Alt+A does not work to access the menu Arkiv in Swedish version of Firefox 45.4.0
Component: Untriaged → Keyboard Navigation
Today, after coming to this page at Bugzilla, Alt+A started working as expected, but when I started to write this message Alt+A selected all message text instead of opening the menu Arkiv.
Component: Keyboard Navigation → sv-SE / Swedish
Product: Firefox → Mozilla Localizations
QA Contact: slicedlime
Version: 45 Branch → unspecified
Hi Magnus, do you still have problem with the access keys (Alt+a)?

It took some time for your report to appear on the Swedish localization team site.
(In reply to az from comment #2)
> Hi Magnus, do you still have problem with the access keys (Alt+a)?
> 
> It took some time for your report to appear on the Swedish localization team
> site.

Hello, az. Yes, when pressing Alt+a when writing this message, for example, I select all text instead of open the menu Arkiv.
Hi Magnus, is this just in the Firefox application or can you reproduce this problem in other Unix applications? What do you have for shortcut under "Redigera->Markera allt"?

/Andreas
Hey, Andreas. This is just in Firefox. In "Redigera -> Markera allt" I have the standard shortcut Ctrl+A.
A very short moment ago, before I started to type this message I could open the menu Arkiv with Alt+A. Now it does not work like that and with Alt+A I select all text instead.
OK, that´s strange. Have you tried to start Firefox without add-ons (Hjälp->Starta om utan tillägg).

Is Firefox 45 the latest version for your rep?

/Andreas
Yes, strange it is. I have no add-ons.

Yes, Firefox 45 is the latest Firefox version in my repository.
It seems I can open Arkiv with Alt+A when I don't have the insertion point in a text field like this one.
Yes, I noticed that too. Found this page https://www.accessfirefox.org/Firefox_Keyboard_and_Mouse_Shortcuts.html who has CTRL + A and ALT + A for Select all in Linux.

So the big question is why? That I can´t answer. Need to ask around.
Alt+A for "Select all" seems like an anomaly when every other shortcut in that category is the same across all three operating systems (knowing Command replaces Control in Mac OS shortcuts) and Ctrl+A also works for "Select all" in Linux.
(In reply to Andreas Pettersson from comment #10)
> So the big question is why? That I can´t answer. Need to ask around.
I became curious about this and from what I can see the same question was asked in http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=104442. Note that this is a very old thread, so Alt+A for select all have been around for ages.

Request for Ctrl+A for select all on Linux was raised in Bug 251081 and probably fixed in bug 257405.

It's still not clear to me whether this was/is a standard shortcut in some Linux flavours or if it was mozilla-only (I'm not a regular Linux user). Anyway, I think it'll be hard to change the Alt+A select all shortcut since it's a general shortcut that is the same regardless of language: https://dxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/a7c654513f2ffd9d9ef38fa2bf512b9e8dae3cdd/dom/xbl/builtin/unix/platformHTMLBindings.xml#14,26,69,79
After some searching on the Internet it seems like Alt+A for "Select all" stems from the program Emacs that has that and a lot of other special text editing shortcuts commonly called "Emacs style key bindings". Here is an article describing how to add those key bindings in Firefox: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Emacs_Keybindings_%28Firefox%29. Why has Firefox preserved perhaps only Alt+A as standard shortcut for "Select all" of the many Emacs style key bindings when you can have them all by editing or adding a file in GTK directory?
To summarize:

In Swedish, the File menu is named "Arkiv" and then the accesskey to open that menu is (naturally) "A", but if you're in a text input field that will conflict with the Linux shortcut for "select all".

Axel: Is there any way we could get rid of this, erm, ancient key combo for "select all"? I would imagine that there are other locales that use "A" as an accesskey...
Status: UNCONFIRMED → NEW
Ever confirmed: true
Flags: needinfo?(l10n)
(In reply to Stefan [:stefanh] from comment #14)
> Axel: Is there any way we could get rid of this, erm, ancient key combo for
> "select all"? I would imagine that there are other locales that use "A" as
> an accesskey...
That's a question for product owners, not l10n. Right now, the only solution you have is to temporarily pick a different character for your localization. And yes, given how many other menus there are, I would be surprised to not see other locales affected.

I suggest to file a separate bug for it. I'm not sure which would be the best component though: it might be Core::Keyboard: Navigation, but starting with Firefox::Untriaged would probably make sense.
Flags: needinfo?(l10n)
(In reply to Stefan [:stefanh] from comment #14)
> To summarize:
> 
> In Swedish, the File menu is named "Arkiv" and then the accesskey to open
> that menu is (naturally) "A", but if you're in a text input field that will
> conflict with the Linux shortcut for "select all".
> 
> Axel: Is there any way we could get rid of this, erm, ancient key combo for
> "select all"? I would imagine that there are other locales that use "A" as
> an accesskey...

To call it a Linux shortcut isn't really appropriate since it is an Emacs shortcut.
(In reply to Francesco Lodolo [:flod] from comment #15)
> (In reply to Stefan [:stefanh] from comment #14)
> > Axel: Is there any way we could get rid of this, erm, ancient key combo for
> > "select all"? I would imagine that there are other locales that use "A" as
> > an accesskey...
> That's a question for product owners, not l10n. Right now, the only solution
> you have is to temporarily pick a different character for your localization.
> And yes, given how many other menus there are, I would be surprised to not
> see other locales affected.
> 
> I suggest to file a separate bug for it. I'm not sure which would be the
> best component though: it might be Core::Keyboard: Navigation, but starting
> with Firefox::Untriaged would probably make sense.

This is already a separate bug report.
I would anyhow recommend to not change the access key for "Arkiv" since I can imagine that it's "A" in most other applications.
(In reply to Stefan [:stefanh] from comment #18)
> I would anyhow recommend to not change the access key for "Arkiv" since I
> can imagine that it's "A" in most other applications.

A wise recommendation, I think. I really would like an answer to my question in comment 13.
(In reply to Magnus Johansson from comment #19) 
> I really would like an answer to my question
> in comment 13.
Sorry, I have no idea. I can only speculate that it has been left as-is, because people have been used to it.
(In reply to Stefan [:stefanh] from comment #20)
> (In reply to Magnus Johansson from comment #19) 
> > I really would like an answer to my question
> > in comment 13.
> Sorry, I have no idea. I can only speculate that it has been left as-is,
> because people have been used to it.

I believe you are correct and that the shortcut now not only is superfluous for the average user but also an obstacle.
So, what happens now? Should I for this bug report correct the descriptions in the drop-down lists Product, Component and Platform?
I would file a new bug, blocking this one. A lot of the discussion in this bug is not really important, what you're asking is to drop the shortcut.
(In reply to Francesco Lodolo [:flod] from comment #23)
> I would file a new bug, blocking this one. A lot of the discussion in this
> bug is not really important, what you're asking is to drop the shortcut.

What in this discussion is not important? Where did I ask to drop the shortcut?
Component: sv-SE / Swedish → Keyboard Navigation
OS: Unspecified → Linux
Product: Mozilla Localizations → Firefox
Hardware: Unspecified → x86
Version: unspecified → 45 Branch
(In reply to Magnus Johansson from comment #24)
> (In reply to Francesco Lodolo [:flod] from comment #23)
> > I would file a new bug, blocking this one. A lot of the discussion in this
> > bug is not really important, what you're asking is to drop the shortcut.
> 
> What in this discussion is not important? Where did I ask to drop the
> shortcut?

Sorry but I'm really not following your line of thoughts then. What does comment 21 mean? That was also the request in comment 14.

IMO the way it is, the bug will simply be moved back to the localization component, suggesting to change the accesskey in the localization.
Axel, or was it Stefan, wanted to get rid of the shortcut but I have not made that suggestion.

Changing the access key in the localization is not a good idea since "Alt+A" for opening the menu Arkiv is very common.
The way I see it there are 2 ways here (note though that I'm not a localizer):
1) Live with the current situation (not being able to open the Arkiv (File) menu using accesskeys under certain circumstances.
2) Get rid of Alt+A as a global Linux shortcut for select all.

Note that there are of course more options here and I'm not a localizer :-)

Personally, I think the best solution would be to choose 2), but I don't have any strong opinion about this. If people here think that this is the right way to go, I can file a new bug and try to drive the change. There are now 27 comments in this bug, and you want to keep a bug report as clean as possible, so moving this bug to another component isn't the best option if we do 2). Also, choosing 1) or 2) means that this bug should be closed as wontfix.
Adding to the confusion of the current situation is the circumstance that in the menu "Redigera -> Markera allt" only Ctrl+A is listed, making Alt+A an obscure way of selecting all.
An equivalent problem with the Dutch version has been reported in bug 1376091, together with a patch that fixes it.
In Firefox version 52.2.0 the cursor doesn't even have to be in a text field for having Alt+A select all. When opening a Settings tab and there press Alt+A it, however, opens the menu Arkiv.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 4 years ago
Resolution: --- → DUPLICATE
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