Navigating on mouse down is bad for accessibility

[joshuajaco]

Navigating on mouse down instead of mouse up is bad for accessibility for several reasons:

1. It breaks the ability to drag and drop links.
2. You cannot "cancel" the navigation. (I often click something and, before releasing, realize I wanted to click something else.)
3. It can cause scrolling issues on mobile, where I only want to scroll but accidentally trigger navigation.

People expect links to work on mouse up and have adapted their workflows accordingly.

Relevant code: https://github.com/ethanniser/NextMaster/blob/24f8acae72bfb1bb7969b86b002f3a2a9c3cdc06/src/components/ui/link.tsx#L105

[dvartic]

It's a tradeoff.

1. Don't drag and drop links.
2. Revert your action through other means.
3. Mousedown on mobile gets triggered the same as click: when you lift your finger son there are no issues here.

People expecations should not dictate potential improvements.

[t4moxjc7]

@dvartic What's the tradeoff?

[remcostoeten]

@t4moxjc7 He probably means the massive performance hit you take waiting for the switch between keydown and keyup being toggled. An unnoticeable amount of time in performance terms, but horrible UX. That’s the trade-off.