[WG: Accessibility] Seeking input for CKEditor issue on providing user help

[Nate Angell]

Perhaps the most workable solution would be to have each editor include a
dedicated help button in the editor toolbar itself that would lead to
documentation specifically for that editor.

For example, CKEditor help button could lead to pages like:
http://docs.cksource.com/CKEditor_3.x/Users_Guide/Quick_Reference
http://docs.cksource.com/CKEditor_3.x/Users_Guide/Accessibility
http://docs.cksource.com/CKEditor_3.x/Users_Guide/Keyboard_Shortcuts

What appears to be a help button in a default CKEditor now just lists
version /credit info, but perhaps that button could deliver other content or
a help button itself is available or could be configured. You can see it on
the full CKEditor demo:
http://ckeditor.com/demo

As a failsafe, general sections on rich text editors and accessibility in
Sakai's native help could include links to the help for all supported rich
text editors, in case navigating to the editor toolbar to find help is
impossible or difficult.

- Nate

On Wed, Jan 5, 2011 at 1:24 PM, Richwine, Brian L <brichwin at indiana.edu>wrote:

>  Hello,
>
>
>
> The CKEditor is a giant leap forward in making the WYSIWYG editor for Sakai
> accessible. There is much about it that is accessible now, to keyboard only
> users especially, that wasn’t accessible in the older FCKEdit.
> Unfortunately, it requires that the user knows of the existence of special
> hot key combinations to access various features. For instance, that they
> need to press Alt+F10 to get access to the CKEditor’s toolbar and to use the
> ESC key to get back out.
>
>
>
> I am wondering about the best method for providing means for the end user
> to have access to the necessary help information for using the WYSIWYG
> editor.
>
>
>
> I checked the tool specific help in couple of tools (Assignments,
> Syllabus), and the Overview page for each tool included a “Using the WYSIWYG
> editor” link in a “How do I?” section. Unfortunately, that page is currently
> specific to the FCKEdit and doesn’t include any hotkeys information. There
> are a few issues I see here:
>
> 1.       This requires the user to activate the tool specific help, know
> what “WYSIWYG” means, and find that link among all the others.
>
> 2.       The editor help information needs to be specific to the editor in
> play (FCKEdit, CKEditor, TinyMCE, etc.) as the hotkeys and availability
> varies by editor.
>
> 3.       End users probably won’t know if they are using a given editor
> (FCKEdit and the CKEditor look very similar).
>
>
>
> I’m wondering if it wouldn’t be best to suggest adding a visible “Editor
> Help” link. It could be positioned right above the editor (aligned to the
> right). This link could bring up the help tool with a page specific to the
> given editor.
>
>
>
> Or, a sidebar could be displayed alongside the editor that contains a short
> list of important help information (hot keys, at least) and a link to the
> larger entry in the help tool. Like how the Confluence system has the “Help
> Tips” sidebar when in Wiki Markup mode.
>
>
>
> Thanks,
>
>   Brian
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Brian Richwine**
>
> Adaptive Technology Support Specialist**
>
> Adaptive Technology and Accessibility Centers**
>
> Indiana University - Bloomington/Indianapolis**
>
> http://iuadapts.indiana.edu**
>
> (812) 856-4112**
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> accessibility mailing list
> accessibility at collab.sakaiproject.org
> http://collab.sakaiproject.org/mailman/listinfo/accessibility
>
> TO UNSUBSCRIBE: send email to
> accessibility-unsubscribe at collab.sakaiproject.org with a subject of
> "unsubscribe"
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://collab.sakaiproject.org/pipermail/accessibility/attachments/20110105/130c5f1d/attachment.html