To add some more notes in advance of the TPAC discussion:

Interactive lists vs. grids

The basic idea would be that interactive lists are to static lists as grids are to tables -- they can still contain mixed and interactive content, but support managed focus between items. The punnett square of lists, interactive lists, grids, and tables could be visualized as follows:

Interactive lists vs. listboxes

Right now, the listbox role is the closest web analog to a desktop interactive list. There are a couple reasons listboxes do not fill the need for the desktop-app-like interactive list pattern:

1. Listboxes are primarily form selection controls, with browser-inferred default selection based on focus. It's impossible to have a listbox without selection.
2. Listbox options do not support the same flexible content model that list items do

Interactive list examples on the web today

1. The Teams app store, with multiple groups of "cards", where each card contains mixed content and each group of cards is a single tab stop.

2. Office online welcome/recent files screen, with files displayed as cards

3. A list of participants in a current meeting, where each participant has mutliple secondary actions but no single main action (or one single non-selection main action)
   

Also ref: #1325

Some open questions to consider:

• What are the platform mappings? (note: this control type exists on windows/mac/ios/android, so these should exist)
• Would an interactive list support selection? If so, how do we differentiate from listbox?
• What is the recommended keyboard model or models for accessing nested interactive content? (note: we don't really have this figured out for grid either)
• Should this be a separate role, or a separate mapping when list items are focusable?

fwiw, i'd submit if there is any overlap in reusing the listitem role, then there would need to be a different parent role to help differentiate current instances of listitems which are focusable for some reason but not necessarily because they represent what this proposal outlines, vs interactive list listitems which would have the potential to convey different/new behaviors and functionality.

This is a good idea! Thank you @smhigley for supplying the examples.

Would an interactive list support selection?

If selection isn’t a part of this, how wpuld the listview role help users?

Discussed during TPAC this week, notes here: https://www.w3.org/2023/09/12-aria-minutes#t01

I summarised all the related issues, comments, and discussion results in a Wiki article. I propose that we work on the proposal directly in this article.
Proposal: Interactive Lists