/skippy-links

A small and easy to use web component to provide dynamic skip links to any page, thus improving the website's accessibility

Primary LanguageTypeScriptMIT LicenseMIT

<skippy-links>

<skippy-links> is a small and easy to use web component to provide dynamic skip links to any page, thus improving the website's accessibility

Read the official docs here.

TOC

  1. What are skip links and why are they important
  2. How to use
  3. How to style
  4. How to contribute

1. 🤔 What are skip links and why are they important?

Assistive technology users often have to tab through a long navigation until they get to the main content. This can be confusing and take a lot of time and energy.

Skip links are links that are placed before any other content and provide a way for assistive technology users to jump to the most important sections of the page, like for instance the main content, or even jump directly to a search input on the page.

Skip links seem like a minor improvement to the page, but they can make a huge difference for assistive technology users!

2. 🚀 How to use

Using the skippy-links is quite easy.

You just need to:

  • import it
  • add the <skippy-links></skip-links> to the page,
  • add the skippy-links-label="..." to any element you want to show on the skip links.

2.1 Install with npm

npm i skippy-links

2.2 Import into your project

<script src="node_modules/skippy-links/dist/skippy-links.js" type="module"></script>

2.3 Add to the page

The skippy-links element should be the first element on the body section of the page

<body>
    <skippy-links></skippy-links>
    <!-- Add your content after the <skip-links> element -->
</body>

2.4 Add skippy-links-label attribute

You define which elements on the page you want to show on the skip links by giving them the skippy-links-label attribute.

For instance if you want to add a link to the <main> section with the "Main Content" label:

<main id="main" skippy-links-label="Main Content">
    <!-- your main content -->
</main>

Make sure the element also has an id!

3. 🎨 How to style

You can style the <skippy-links> element like any other element on your page.

The links inside it are on the shadow dom, so you can't style them directly, but you can use the following CSS variables:

Variable default value
--sl-color-primary #0000ee
--sl-element-height 4rem
--sl-link-position absolute
--sl-link-top 0
--sl-link-bottom 0
--sl-link-left 0
--sl-link-right 0
--sl-link-width 100%
--sl-link-height var(--sl-element-height)
--sl-link-display flex
--sl-link-align-items center
--sl-link-justify-content center
--sl-link-color var(--sl-color-primary)
--sl-link-color-focus var(--sl-color-primary)
--sl-link-color-hover var(--sl-color-primary)
--sl-link-font-size 1rem
--sl-link-text-decoration underline
--sl-link-padding 1rem
--sl-link-opacity 1
--sl-link-opacity-focus 1
--sl-link-opacity-hover 1
--sl-link-transform translateY(-100%)
--sl-link-transform-focus translateY(0)
--sl-link-transform-hover translateY(0)
--sl-link-box-sizing border-box
--sl-link-transition-speed .25s
--sl-link-transition-speed-reduced-motion 0

Example:

skippy-links {
    --sl-color-primary: red;
    --sl-link-opacity: .5;
}

4. ✏️ How to contribute

If you find any bugs or have any ideas on how to improve this component, please let us know at the skippy-links github

📚 Wanna learn more about skip links?