Smooth Navigation Menu (v2.1) (ddsmoothmenus)

1) Script Title: Smooth Navigation Menu (v2.1)

2) Script URL (on DD): http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamici...smoothmenu.htm

3) Describe problem: When viewing these menus on a touch screen environment (i.e., IPad) the menus pause ok, however when you touch the primary (top level) menu, you are unable to navigate to the associated link. The secondary menus work fine (i.e., you touch them and they navigate to their associated link), but not the top level menus - horizontal or vertical.

Can this be fixed?

Thanks

This is exactly my problem also so I'm very disappointed to find no replies :( I've searched high and low but unable to find the answer anywhere.

If anyone can please offer help on this I'd be most appreciative. Thanks in advance!

Dave

Disabling the top-level link appears to be intentional in this script. If you think about it logically, it's actually a desirable behaviour and one which many web devs have adopted when retrofitting established sites/menu scripts for touch accessibility. The reason for disabling the top-level links is usually to standardise behaviour between Android and iOS, since they interpret hover events differently; In iOS you click once to activate hover, click again to activate the link, but in the case of Android, a click activates the hover and link at the same time, which for a hover-activated menu with top-level hyperlink, would make all sub-menus inaccessible for those devices.

Responsive design and the multitude of devices on the market has put menus under much scrutiny in recent years - and not just the scripts/CSS that power the menus; the activation method and structure too. Click-activated menus are becoming more commonplace, and with them, a structural pattern where top-level links are eliminated altogether (much like how this DD menu script is already behaving in touch devices).

So I would suggest that instead of trying to change the behaviour of this menu, you actually work with it and rethink your menu structures. This would mean removing the top-level hyperlinks and moving/adding those items to the top of their respective sub-menus. Example here http://williamlevick.derbyshire.sch.uk/ (most evident in the "Children > Key Stage 1" and "Children > Key Stage 2" menus where the same button text is used, although ALL menus use this pattern, just with different button text. )

Thanks so much for taking the time to explain this to me Beverley - it's appreciated.

I was thinking in the back of my mind that it would probably come down to restructuring my menu. Duplication of the top level menu item and first child link isn't the ideal solution but having viewed the example you gave me, it may not be such a bad thing. It's certainly the best way around this problem because I want to keep the smooth menu there as it works beautifully in a mouse-click environment.

At the end of the day, if I can achieve a user friendly result in the different devices that it may be viewed in then I'll be happy. Thanks again for your time and have a great day. Cheers, - Dave.