Manual:Access keys

Access keys or keyboard shortcuts are defined for many actions in MediaWiki. This page documents all access keys in use, and details the ways in which developers can add them to MediaWiki core and extensions. End user help is at Help:Keyboard shortcuts .

Access keys are invoked with different modifier keys on different operating systems and web browsers. The Wikipedia:Access key page lists all combinations. MediaWiki will add tooltips where it can to help users discover what access keys are available for a given action (including platform-specific modifiers).

Defining an access key

Defining an access key is usually done via the accesskey="" HTML attribute, and in some cases (e.g. in VisualEditor) is done with custom keypress handling.

The key used should not be hard-coded, but should be added as a system message. The message should start with accesskey-extname- and its message documentation in qqq.json should include the {{doc-accesskey}} template from Translatewiki.net. Acccess key messages should also be listed in TranslateWiki's groups/MediaWiki/MediaWiki.yaml file (for example, Gerrit change 780284).

All access keys should be recorded on this page (see below), to make it easier for developers to choose new available access keys.

JavaScript

To create a button with an access key the following code could be used:

var myButton = new OO.ui.ButtonWidget( {
	label: mw.msg( 'myext-myaction' ),
	accessKey: mw.msg( 'accesskey-myext-myaction' ),
	title: mw.msg( 'myext-myaction-title' )
} );

Note that when using OOUI, it's worth adding a title to any AccessKeyedElement because this results in the access key be appended to the title/tooltip and so is more discoverable by users.

PHP

The Linker::tooltipAndAccesskeyAttribs() method should be used when constructing links with access keys. For example:

en.json

"accesskey-myext-myaction": "[[:Template:Doc-accesskey]]",
"tooltip-myext-myaction": "Tooltip for my action",
"myext-myaction": "Link text for my action",

qqq.json

"accesskey-myext-myaction": "a",
"tooltip-myext-myaction": "This is my action",
"myext-myaction": "My Action",

Foo.php

$link = \Html::element(
	'a',
	\Linker::tooltipAndAccesskeyAttribs( 'myext-myaction' ),
	wfMessage( 'myext-myaction' )
);

This will result in the following HTML:

<a title="This is my action [a]" accesskey="a">My Action</a>"

In JavaScript-enabled browsers, the [a] will be dynamically updated (to e.g. [Ctrl-Shift-a]) by updateTooltipAccessKeys() to include the correct modifier keys depending on the user's browser and operating system.

MediaWiki core

Message	Access key	Usage
accesskey-pt-userpage	.	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-anonuserpage	.	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-mytalk	n	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-anontalk	n	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-preferences		Codesearch
accesskey-pt-watchlist	l	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-mycontris	y	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-anoncontribs	y	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-login	o	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-login-private	o	Codesearch
accesskey-pt-logout		Codesearch
accesskey-pt-createaccount		Codesearch
accesskey-ca-view		Codesearch
accesskey-ca-talk	t	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-edit	e	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-addsection	+	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-viewsource	e	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-history	h	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-protect	=	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-unprotect	=	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-delete	d	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-undelete	d	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-move	m	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-watch	w	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-unwatch	w	Codesearch
accesskey-search	f	Codesearch
accesskey-search-go		Codesearch
accesskey-search-fulltext		Codesearch
accesskey-p-logo		Codesearch
accesskey-n-help-mediawiki		Codesearch
accesskey-n-mainpage	z	Codesearch
accesskey-n-mainpage-description	z	Codesearch
accesskey-n-portal		Codesearch
accesskey-n-currentevents		Codesearch
accesskey-n-recentchanges	r	Codesearch
accesskey-n-randompage	x	Codesearch
accesskey-n-help		Codesearch
accesskey-t-whatlinkshere	j	Codesearch
accesskey-t-recentchangeslinked	k	Codesearch
accesskey-feed-rss		Codesearch
accesskey-feed-atom		Codesearch
accesskey-t-contributions		Codesearch
accesskey-t-emailuser		Codesearch
accesskey-t-info		Codesearch
accesskey-t-permalink		Codesearch
accesskey-t-print	p	Codesearch
accesskey-t-upload	u	Codesearch
accesskey-t-specialpages	q	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-main	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-user	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-media	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-special		Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-project	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-image	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-mediawiki	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-template	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-help	c	Codesearch
accesskey-ca-nstab-category	c	Codesearch
accesskey-minoredit	i	Codesearch
accesskey-save	s	Codesearch
accesskey-publish	s	Codesearch
accesskey-preview	p	Codesearch
accesskey-diff	v	Codesearch
accesskey-compareselectedversions	v	Codesearch
accesskey-watch	w	Codesearch
accesskey-watchlist-expiry		Codesearch
accesskey-upload	s	Codesearch
accesskey-preferences-save	s	Codesearch
accesskey-summary	b	Codesearch
accesskey-userrights-set	s	Codesearch
accesskey-blockip-block	s	Codesearch
accesskey-export	s	Codesearch
accesskey-import	s	Codesearch
accesskey-watchlistedit-normal-submit	s	Codesearch
accesskey-watchlistedit-raw-submit	s	Codesearch

Extensions

Extension	Message name	Access key	Usages
CiteThisPage	accesskey-citethispage		Codesearch
Drafts	accesskey-drafts-save	g	Codesearch
EducationProgram	accesskey-ep-form-save	s	Codesearch
EducationProgram	accesskey-ep-edit-institution	e	Codesearch
EducationProgram	accesskey-ep-edit-course	e	Codesearch
EducationProgram	accesskey-ep-summary	b	Codesearch
EducationProgram	accesskey-ep-minor	i	Codesearch
MediaUploader	accesskey-save-upload-campaign	s	Codesearch
MediaUploader	accesskey-cancel-upload-campaign	c	Codesearch
PageForms	accesskey-ca-formedit	&	Codesearch
UploadWizard	accesskey-save-upload-campaign	s	Codesearch
UploadWizard	accesskey-cancel-upload-campaign	c	Codesearch
WatchSubpages	accesskey-watchsubpages-submit	s	Codesearch
WikiEditor	accesskey-wikieditor-realtimepreview	)	Codesearch
Wikibase	accesskey-t-wikibase	g	Codesearch
FlaggedRevs	accesskey-ca-current	v	Codesearch
FlaggedRevs	accesskey-ca-stable	c	Codesearch
VisualEditor	accesskey-ca-editsource	e	Codesearch
VisualEditor	accesskey-ca-ve-edit	v	Codesearch
ListTransclusions	accesskey-t-listtransclusions		Codesearch

Defining an access key

JavaScript

PHP

MediaWiki core

Extensions

See also