Topic on 2017 wikitext editor/Feedback

From a pain-disabled user

3
Summary by Whatamidoing (WMF)
Geekdiva (talkcontribs)

(My user page on en.WP discusses my limitations to some degree.)

Since the 1990s I've seen many tools migrate from text-based interfaces to graphical ones, and not always with good results for various sets of users with various disabilities. I've just used this editor, and it did not surprise me. It significantly increased the amount of mouse clicks I was forced to use to complete a task.

(Side note: Clicking Publish... to get to Preview... is right up there in awkwardness with Windows' Start > Shut Down.)

One of the reasons I wasn't surprised was because of the careless usurpation of Alt-Shift-V. Even though as of the time of this post it still is in the tooltip on en.WP if you hover over the Show changes button, the shortcut's function is now to switch you to the Visual Editor.

There is at least one bug about this, but if you look at my en.WP user page, you might get some understanding of why, when I found it had been closed or had been given some such status, I didn't try to figure out how reopen the issue. I have to do what I can, when I can. I was discouraged and out of when-I-can.

So now I have to use what hotkeys I can simply to get to that button's location before wasting an incrementally pain-filled mouse click on it, and I use that view often to make sure I don't upload the wrong thing after, say, passing out or a stillsdisease.org fever spike. And right before I click, I get irritated by a tooltip that still shows me how I used to check my [V]ersion before saving it by comparing it with the previous [V]ersion.

It's like a poorly-formed curb cut: you don't notice it's a problem unless you have to push overly hard against it to move on when it's supposed to be there to help you move on in the first place.

Thank you for all your hard work in general, your patience with my irritated tone in this post, and your consideration of how to make this tool in particular less mouse-click dependent for those of us who are rodent-impaired. I'd consider help on the Alt-Shift-V problem a bonus.

I will try to take notes the next time I use the 2017 Wikitext Editor so the bulk of my feedback's details on this page can be on what this page is actually about. Heh!

TheDJ (talkcontribs)

Just a personal note as a volunteer who often tries to fix and evaluate these kinds of accessibility problems.

1: You can always mail me with whatever problem you have and I will make sure we at least have a ticket for it, an analysis of the problem and an idea of what would be required to fix it. The actual fix might take a while.

2: "how to make this tool in particular less mouse-click dependent" We strive for all tools to be fully keyboard accessible, but often we miss something, because we don't rely on this accessibility ourselves. Please DO tell us, it is important to us.

3: More mouse clicks are going to be needed, because the software gains ever more features and complexity and we can't put all that in a single window of course. Again, we try to make everything keyboard accessible, if you need something, please let us know either by mail or in phabricator.

Whatamidoing (WMF) (talkcontribs)

Hi Geekdiva,

Thanks for this note. I've filed a bug about the alt-shift-v problem.

For visual mode, I think that you might want to take a look at the keyboard shortcuts. They're at VisualEditor/Keyboard shortcuts – no, don't reach for the mouse: if you can't tab to the link in your browser, then Alt+ Shift+f (or your usual meta keys + f; it's Ctrl+ Option+f on my Mac) should take you to the search box, and then you can type the name without another mouse click.

There are also a few undocumented shortcuts in the visual mode that might interest you: {{ opens the template dialog, and [[ opens the link tool, which is handy for both avoiding cut-and-paste maneuvers and perhaps a little easier to remember for long-time editors than the official version, which is Control+k (for PCs; Command-K for Macs). And the reason that meta-k is worth mentioning is because there's a new shortcut for the citation dialog, which is Control+ Shift+K ( Command+ Shift+K on a Mac).

I'd be happy to hear more from you about whatever you want to share, from the bad curb cut to the minor paper cut.

P.S. This message, including formatting, was typed in visual mode, entirely from the keyboard (except that I'll have to use the trackpad to click the reply button), because I share your POV on the subject. It's not possible to do everything without a mouse/pointer here, but it's pretty close.  :-)

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