Allow Deselect on Single Selects using keyboard (esc key?)

[koenpeters]

In the case of a single select that allows deselection it would be a usability improvement to be able to do this using only the keyboard. Currently we need to use the mouse to click on the x. I propose to allow deselecting of a selected single select by hitting the esc key.

[tjschuck]

As an interesting point of comparison, a native select kind of allows deselecting with a keyboard while Chosen does not. (That's usually a good point to start from when trying to justify a feature change!)

A native select does not seem to have an easy way to deselect, i.e. hitting backspace or escape, but you can always use your keyboard to just navigate back up to the first empty option and select it.

For Chosen, you can never go back to selecting the first empty option in any way without clicking the X.

Though I'm not sure Esc is the right option, it does seem like it would be nice to support keyboard-only deselect.

[koenpunt]

Adding a tabindex to the × button could be an easy fix

[oliver-graetz]

I also want this feature, but I'd like it if the DEL key would also work for removing the selection.

[pfiller]

#982 (closed un-merge) had an interesting solution for deselection. It just made it so that choosing the selected option in a single select with "allow deselect" turned on would deselect the option. That sentence is a mouthful ...

Something to consider at least.

[koenpeters]

So far we have had three proposals:

1. - Have a keyboard shortcut (like esc, or del)
2. - Add a tabindex to the close X link
3. - Select the selection again.

I personally think the shortcut is the best solution. The tabindex would be annoying since people expect to navigate to the next form field when they hit tab once. Reselecting the selected option goes against the expected behaviour as well: people expect that doing that would keep the selected option selected. So both these options would confuse people I think.

With respect to the first option I feel that the del key would indeed be the better choice. It's easily discoverable, quick to execute and doesn't conflict with other default behaviour.

[kevin-brown]

With respect to the first option I feel that the del key would indeed be the better choice.

Just a recommendation from your friends over at Select2.

Select2 supports both delete/del and backspace for clearing the selection of a single select. This has to do with Mac keyboards calling the "backspace" key (as most know it) the "delete" key (ref: select2/select2#396).