1782348 - [Meta] Full keyboard access for tab management (switching/selecting/moving/closing tabs) - port platform behaviour and more

Status: NEW

(Thunderbird :: Toolbars and Tabs, defect)

Description

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

+++ This bug was initially created as a clone of Bug #1754097 +++

Thunderbird currently lacks keyboard accessible tab management. We need to port some essential behaviours from the platform. Plus we should try to get some more useful behaviours implemented according to relevant aria specs, either on the platform (preferred), or in Thunderbird. This bug is to keep track of this in Thunderbird.

(Scenario: press tab until focus is on the current tab-top.)

• Port platform behaviour for switching tab focus with arrow right/left keys (works in FF 102.0.1).
• Port platform behaviour for toggling selection of focused tab with Ctrl+Space (works in FF 102.0.1).
• Implement closing focused tab with Del key (not yet on FF 102.0.1) per specs.
• Implement moving selected tab(s) with Alt+arrow right/left keys (not yet on FF 102.0.1).

For fixing these, I suggest adding per-behaviour satellite bugs which block this bug as appropriate.

See Bug 1754097, comment #1 following for some related discussion.

(In reply to Henry Wilkes (they/them) [:henry] from comment #1)

[After we've made the close buttons on tabs non-focusable in Bug 1754097], we should
allow "Delete" [key on a focused tab to close the tab], which follows https://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria-practices/#keyboard-interaction-21

We should have the Right-Left controls, but I don't think we should auto-open the tab when doing so like firefox because our tab switches are currently disruptive (e.g. reloads messages). We could wait for an explicit "Space" or "Enter" instead.

We would also need to make sure tabs are scrolled into view if the arrowscrollbox overflows.

Maybe we could add controls to re-order tabs. I think you can only do so with drag and drop right now.

Comment 1

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Re-assigning Henry.

Comment 2

[Henry Wilkes (they/them) [:henry-x]]

(In reply to Thomas D. (:thomas8) from comment #0)

allow "Delete" [key on a focused tab to close the tab], which follows https://www.w3.org/TR/wai-aria-practices/#keyboard-interaction-21

Recommended practice from WAI is now at https://www.w3.org/WAI/ARIA/apg/patterns/tabpanel/