How useful is a:active for mobile user?

Forum Moderators: not2easy

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How useful is a:active for mobile user?

deeper

4:10 pm on Oct 17, 2014 (gmt 0)

Hi,
the state "active" highlightens the anchor of a click for the moment of clicking, i.e. the second before loading the clicked page.

I have no mobile device and I ask myself how useful this may be.

It is no substitute for missing hover on most mobile devices, because a:active starts AFTER clicking and only for 1 second.

What are your experiences as mobile user?

not2easy

8:22 pm on Oct 17, 2014 (gmt 0)

Different devices treat active states differently, if you want to know what appearance or "stateful" changes you can control, get information here: [developers.google.com...]

lucy24

8:56 pm on Oct 17, 2014 (gmt 0)

Personally I think it's a pretty pointless style anyway, even for desktops. The only time it does anything is when you've already clicked on the link-- at which point it's too late to be giving the user fresh information. So it's just part of a prettiness package. And another 20-30 bytes for the user to download on who-knows-what connection speed.

deeper

9:52 pm on Oct 17, 2014 (gmt 0)

@not2easy:
Thanks for the link.
My question is more about real life experience especially as mobile user.

Like lucy24, I think it's pretty pointless for both desktop and mobile, but some say it may be helpful for mobile user, because most of them are unable to use hover. Therefore active could "save" a bit, but as hover and active are working quite different, I really don't see the help of active on non-hover-mobiles.