Free - Improving Accessibility for Motor Impaired Users

The unique requirements for motor impaired web users can often be overlooked or poorly implemented. Motor impairments can be caused by a stroke, Parkinson's disease, Multiple Sclerosis (MS), a physical disability or even a broken arm. This group of users essentially have limited or no ability to use a mouse.

Have users opt in for audio

Some motor impaired web users utilise voice recognition software to navigate through web pages. If pages on your website start to play audio without users knowing about this in advance then this can severely conflict with the voice recognition software.

There's nothing wrong with using audio but do make sure that it doesn't start by default when users arrive at the page. Instead, provide a link/button that users can select to start the audio.

What not to do

Don't change the tab order (unless you have a very good reason to do so)

Keyboard-only users tab through links and form items in the order in which they're placed in the HTML source code. The default tabbing order is usually perfectly logical so it doesn't need changing.

The tabindex attribute can be used to change the on-page tabbing order but is rarely necessary. Items with the tabindex attribute assigned to them get tabbed to first in order of hierarchy, regardless of their position in the HTML source code.

The only logical reason to change the tab order is if 95%+ of users go straight to one particular item on the page (e.g. a search form). Making this the first item users tab to would make perfect sense.