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Bug 322508

Summary: Allow easier keyboard navigation of filter and sorting columns
Product: [Tools] MAT Reporter: Andrew Johnson <andrew_johnson>
Component: GUIAssignee: Project Inbox <mat.gui-inbox>
Status: RESOLVED FIXED QA Contact:
Severity: enhancement    
Priority: P3 CC: krum.tsvetkov
Version: 1.0Keywords: accessibility
Target Milestone: ---   
Hardware: PC   
OS: Windows XP   
Whiteboard:
Bug Depends on:    
Bug Blocks: 300655    

Description Andrew Johnson CLA 2010-08-12 07:36:08 EDT 
The 
Columns -> Edit Filter
Columns -> Sort By
options allow filters to be changed and columns sorted using the keyboard.

I've an idea to make this easier for users.

Selecting the filter row by moving the selection to the top row, then hitting enter should open the filter editor for the first column. (Default selection)
Using the traversal arrow keys should then select the next or previous filter editor cell. 
Using another key combination e.g. traversal arrow next (or down) with shift should sort the column in descending order, using the arrow up with shift should sort the column in ascending order. This is easier to understand compared to toggling the direction.

I have some code available to do this.

A minor consideration is that the tree viewer disposed the filter row when resorting or filtering, which stopped the current editing of the filter row.
Comment 1 Andrew Johnson CLA 2010-08-15 17:29:29 EDT 
This isn't quite as simple - currently the cursor keys allow editing of the filter and moving to the beginning or end of the line and selecting the text.

Perhaps there is a way to select columns or the cell, rather than the edit text, then the traversal makes more sense.
Comment 2 Andrew Johnson CLA 2010-09-09 17:34:25 EDT 
Existing

The left and right cursor keys are used to move the cursor in the filter.
Shift-left moves and selected characters to the left
Shift-right moves and selected characters to the right
Ctrl-left jumps to the beginning
Ctrl-right jumps to the end
Ctrl-shift-left jumps and selects to the beginning
Ctrl-shift-right jumps and selects to the beginning
Enter completes editing the filter

Suggested behaviour

Use up/down arrow to move to the filter row
Enter selects the first column filter
Up arrow sorts the column in ascending order
Down arrow sorts the column in descending order
Shift-down moves the column to the right
Shift-up moves the column to the left
Ctrl-down makes the column wider
Ctrl-up makes the column narrower
Tab moves to the next column filter based on current order & cycles at the end
Shift-tab moves to the previous column filter based on current order & cycles at the end
Ctrl-tab moves focus to the next window (like tab used to)
Ctrl-shift-tab moves focus to the previous window
Comment 3 Andrew Johnson CLA 2010-09-10 08:47:18 EDT 
We need to decide where to document these keyboard alternatives, but this is a more general problem to be considered by the accessibility defect.