What is the HTML tabindex attribute

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What is the tabindex attribute used for in HTML

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In Simple words  tabindex is used to focus on elements  Syntax  tabindex  numeric value  This numeric value is the weight of element  Lower value will be accessed first

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The tabindex is used to define a sequence that users follow when they use the Tab key to navigate through a page  By default  the natural tabbing order will match the source order in the markup      The tabindex content attribute allows authors to control whether an element is supposed to be focusable  whether it is supposed to be reachable using sequential focus navigation  and what is to be the relative order of the element for the purposes of sequential focus navigation  The name  tab index  comes from the common use of the  tab  key to navigate through the focusable elements  The term  tabbing  refers to moving forward through the focusable elements that can be reached using sequential focus navigation    W3C Recommendation   HTML5   Section 7 4 1 Sequential focus navigation and the tabindex attribute   The tabindex starts at 0 or any positive whole number and increments upward   It s common to see the value 0 avoided because in older versions of Mozilla and IE  the tabindex would start at 1  move on to 2  and only after 2 would it go to 0 and then 3   The maximum integer value for tabindex is 32767   If elements have the same tabindex then the tabindex will match the source order in the markup   A negative value will remove the element from the tab index so it will never be focused   If an element is assigned a tabindex of -1 it will remove the element and it will never be focusable but focus can be given to the element programmatically using element focus     If you specify the tabindex attribute with no value or an empty value it will be ignored   If the disabled attribute is set on an element which has a tabindex  the element will be ignored     If a tabindex is set anywhere within the page regardless of where it is in relation to the rest of the code  it could be in the footer  content area  where-ever  if there is a defined tabindex then the tab order will start at the element which is explicitly assigned the lowest tabindex value above 0   It will then cycle through the elements defined and only after the explicit tabindex elements have been tabbed through  will it return to the beginning of the document and follow the natural tab order     In the HTML4 spec only the following elements support the tabindex attribute  anchor  area  button  input  object  select  and textarea   But the HTML5 spec  with accessibility in mind  allows all elements to be assigned tabindex   --  For example   lt ul tabindex  -1  gt     lt li tabindex  1  gt  lt  li gt     lt li tabindex  2  gt  lt  li gt     lt li tabindex  3  gt  lt  li gt   lt  ul gt    is the same as   lt ul tabindex  -1  gt     lt li tabindex  1  gt  lt  li gt     lt li tabindex  1  gt  lt  li gt     lt li tabindex  1  gt  lt  li gt   lt  ul gt    because regardless of the fact that they are all assigned tabindex  1   they will still follow the same order  the first one is first  and the last one is last   This is also the same     lt div gt     lt a gt  lt  a gt     lt a gt  lt  a gt     lt a gt  lt  a gt   lt  div gt    because you do not need to explicitly define the tabIndex if it s default behavior   A div by default will not be focusable  the anchor tags will

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Tabbing through controls usually happens sequentially as they appear on the HTML code   Using tabindex  the tabbing will flow from control with the lowest tabindex to the control with the highest tabindex in tabindex sequential order

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tabindex is a global attribute responsible for two things    it sets the order of  focusable  elements and it makes elements  focusable     In my mind the second thing is even more important than the first one  There are very few elements that are focusable by default  e g   lt a gt  and form controls   Developers very often add some JavaScript event handlers  like  onclick   on not focusable elements   lt div gt    lt span gt  and so on   and the way to make your interface be responsive not only to mouse events but also to keyboard events  e g   onkeypress   is to make such elements focusable  Lastly  if you don t want to set the order but just make your element focusable use tabindex  0  on all such elements    lt div tabindex  0  gt  lt  div gt    Also  if you don t want it to be focusable via the tab key then use tabindex  -1   For example  the below link will not be focused while using tab keys to traverse    lt a href     tabindex  -1  gt Tab key cannot reach here  lt  a gt

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the values you set determine the order that your keyboard focus will move between elements on the website   In the following example  the first time you press tab  your cursor will move to  foo  then  awesome  then  bar   lt input id  foo  tabindex  1     gt   lt input id  bar  tabindex  3     gt   lt input id  awesome  tabindex  2     gt    If you have not defined tab indexes anywhere  the keyboard focus will follow the HTML tags of you page in the order in which they are defined in the HTML document   If you tab more times than you have specified tabindexes for  the focus will move as if there were no tabindexes  i e  in the order of appearance of the HTML tags

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Normally  when the user tabs from field to field in a form  in a browser that allows tabbing  not all browsers do  the order is the order the fields appear in the HTML code   However  sometimes you want the tab order to flow a little differently  In that case  you can number the fields using TABINDEX  The tabs then flow in order from lowest TABINDEX to highest   More info on this can be found here w3   another good illustration can be found here

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The HTML tabindex atribute is responsible for indicating if an element is reachable by keyboard navigation   When the user presses the Tab key the focus is shifted from one element to another  By using the tabindex atribute  the tab order flow is shifted

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It can be used to alter the default form element focus navigation sequence   So if you ve got   text input A  text input B  submit button C   by using the tab key you navigate through A- B- C  Tabindex allows you to change that flow

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When the user presses the tab button the user will be taken through the form in the order 1  2  and 3 as indicated in the example below   For example   Name   lt input name  name  tabindex  1     gt  Age   lt input name  age  tabindex  3     gt  Email   lt input name  email  tabindex  2     gt

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Controlling the order of tabbing  pressing the tab key to move focus  within the page   Reference  http   www w3 org TR html401 interact forms html h-17 11 1

[html] What is the HTML tabindex attribute?

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