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Motif and CDE 2.1 Style Guide Reference

First-Letter Cursor Navigation

Reference

Description

First-letter cursor navigation is an internal navigation technique used in a selection scope in which entering a printing character moves the cursor in the scope to the next item whose textual label begins with that character.

Figure 28. First-Letter Cursor Navigation.




View figure.

When to Use

Required
Provide first-letter cursor navigation in a selection scope only if the selection scope does not support a keystroke-based mechanism such as mnemonic navigation.

Recommended
Provide first-letter cursor navigation in all selection scopes that associate textual labels with each selectable item.

Guidelines

Required
Skip white spaces that begin a textual label to determine the first character of a textual label used to match an item.

Recommended
If the current language environment supports characters with multiple cases, such as uppercase and lowercase, allow the user to press letters of any case to match a specific textual label.

Recommended
If the current language environment supports characters with multiple cases, such as uppercase and lowercase, allow the user to press letters of any case to match a specific textual label.

Required
When a user types a printing character in a scope by using first-letter cursor navigation, move the location cursor in the scope to the next item whose textual label starts with that letter.

Required
When a user enters a printing character that has no valid match, do not move the location cursor in the selection scope.

Required
When a printing character entered into a text-display field that has focus is used for first-letter cursor navigation of an associated list, select the item matched and place its text contents into the text-display field. If there is no valid match, generate a warning signal and do not make any changes to the appearance of the list or text-display field.

Required
When a printing character entered into a text-display field that has focus is used for first-letter cursor navigation of an associated list, and the list is not displayed, do one of the following:

  1. If pressing V would display the list, make entering the character display it as well.

  2. Navigate in the list as indicated and select the cursored list item, displaying it in the text field without displaying the list.

    3. Recommended
    When focus is in a text-display field that supports first-letter cursor navigation of an associated list, pressing Ctrl V and Ctrl ^, respectively, moves the cursor, selects the next or previous matching item that matches the prefix, and places its text contents into the text-display field.

    Essential Related Topics

    For more information, see the Combination Box (Control), Cursor, and Drop-Down Combination Box (Control) reference pages.

    Supplemental Related Topics

    For more information, see the Container (Control), Drop-Down List (Control), and List Box (Control) reference pages.

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