Exploring the challenges in creating an accessible sortable list (drag-and-drop) – The GitHub Blog
July 26, 2024
Drag-and-drop is a highly interactive and visual interface. We often use drag-and-drop to perform tasks like uploading files, reordering browser bookmarks, or even moving a card in solitaire. It can be hard to imagine completing most of these tasks without a mouse and even harder without using a screen or visual aid. This is why the Accessibility team at GitHub considers drag-and-drop a “high-risk pattern,” often leading to accessibility barriers and a lack of effective solutions in the industry.
Recently, our team worked to develop a solution for a more accessible sortable list, which we refer to as ‘one-dimensional drag-and-drop.’ In our first step toward making drag-and-drop more accessible, we scoped our efforts to explore moving items along a single axis.
Source: Exploring the challenges in creating an accessible sortable list (drag-and-drop) – The GitHub Blog
A lot of the interaction patterns and core UI widgets we talk for granted have very subtle complexities that aren’t immediately apparent (until they aren’t there).
Here the folks at Github looked at a subset of Drag and Drop, and the challenges of implementing this in an accessible way.
