Eslint-plugin-jsx-a11y: anchor-is-valid should allow named anchors

[trevorr]

Shouldn't the following be considered valid?

<a name="my-anchor">...</a>

It currently generates warnings:

The href attribute is required for an anchor to be keyboard accessible. Provide a valid, navigable address as the href value. If you cannot provide an href, but still need the element to resemble a link, use a button and change it with appropriate styles. Learn more: https://github.com/evcohen/eslint-plugin-jsx-a11y/blob/master/docs/rules/anchor-is-valid.md jsx-a11y/anchor-is-valid

[ljharb]

Why? Since html5 you wouldn't generally want an <a name> any more, you'd use an ID on the appropriate element.

[trevorr]

Using the tag can be useful for decorating the anchors or exposing them through browser extensions (e.g. Display #Anchors).

[ljharb]

Everything with an ID is an anchor in HTML5, so I think that extension probably just isn't really useful in the modern web. Can you elaborate on what you mean by "decorating"?

[trevorr]

I just meant by styling. I've seen pages that use a faint dotted underline on anchors that are intended for external linking.

Anyway, you're probably right that I could just use id instead. Still, it doesn't seem like this rule should flag <a name> as invalid just because there are other ways to accomplish an anchor.

[ljharb]

Perhaps not, but it’s not just that there’s other ways - <a name> is widely discouraged/deprecated in favor of using IDs.

[trevorr]

I did some more research, and the HTML5 spec calls it "obsolete but conforming". That's not as strong as deprecated, but I suppose it's official enough that there's no point in changing the rule. Thanks for the quick response, @ljharb!