react / react/react-native

Touchable focus events not triggering with keyboard (needed for accessibility)

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API: Keyboard Issue: Author Provided Repro
Dominant language
C++
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Description

Description

I am trying to add custom focus styles if a pressable is focused to make the keyboard focus visible in any case (dark/light mode, different background colors etc).

It seems like TouchableOpacity and TouchableHightlight both get forwarded from TouchableWithoutFeedback, which has the onFocus and onBlur events. I was trying to hold a focus state with these events to render styles dynamically. However, they do not get triggered at all, even if I use TouchableWithoutFeedback, which leads me to think that's the culprit.

Accessibility requires visibility of focus states. Is there another way to retrieve focus states?

Steps to reproduce

Here's a little example:

const [isFocused, setIsFocused] = useState(false);

return (
  // same with `TouchableWithoutFeedback` and `TouchableOpacity`
  <TouchableHighlight
    onFocus={() => setIsFocused(true)}
    onBlur={() => setIsFocused(false)}
    style={{
      backgroundColor: isFocused?"gray":"transparent",
    }}
  >
    ...
  </TouchableHighlight>
);
React Native Version

0.74.3

Affected Platforms

Runtime - Android

Output of npx react-native info
System:
  OS: macOS 14.5
  CPU: (12) arm64 Apple M2 Pro
  Memory: 109.05 MB / 16.00 GB
  Shell:
    version: "5.9"
    path: /bin/zsh
Binaries:
  Node:
    version: 20.13.1
    path: ~/Library/Caches/fnm_multishells/94190_1719818822541/bin/node
  Yarn: Not Found
  npm:
    version: 10.5.2
    path: ~/Library/Caches/fnm_multishells/94190_1719818822541/bin/npm
  Watchman:
    version: 2024.06.10.00
    path: /opt/homebrew/bin/watchman
Managers:
  CocoaPods:
    version: 1.15.2
    path: /Users/d.timur/.rbenv/shims/pod
SDKs:
  iOS SDK:
    Platforms:
      - DriverKit 23.5
      - iOS 17.5
      - macOS 14.5
      - tvOS 17.5
      - visionOS 1.2
      - watchOS 10.5
  Android SDK: Not Found
IDEs:
  Android Studio: 2023.2 AI-232.10300.40.2321.11668458
  Xcode:
    version: 15.4/15F31d
    path: /usr/bin/xcodebuild
Languages:
  Java:
    version: 17.0.11
    path: /opt/homebrew/opt/openjdk@17/bin/javac
  Ruby:
    version: 2.7.6
    path: /Users/d.timur/.rbenv/shims/ruby
npmPackages:
  "@react-native-community/cli": Not Found
  react:
    installed: 18.2.0
    wanted: 18.2.0
  react-native:
    installed: 0.74.2
    wanted: 0.74.2
  react-native-macos: Not Found
npmGlobalPackages:
  "*react-native*": Not Found
Android:
  hermesEnabled: true
  newArchEnabled: false
iOS:
  hermesEnabled: true
  newArchEnabled: false
Stacktrace or Logs
-
Reproducer

https://github.com/proohit/focus-example

Screenshots and Videos

No response

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with the linked focus-example reproducer and trace how TouchableHighlight, TouchableOpacity, and TouchableWithoutFeedback handle onFocus and onBlur on Android. Confirm the keyboard-focus behavior and define done as focus events firing reliably so a custom visible focus style can be rendered.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
react-native, typescript
Domain
accessibility, mobile
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
35/100

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