title: What's current state-of-the-art for accessibility in jQuery UI Datepicker?
body: <p><strong>Preamble</strong><br>
  We're adding accessibility to some parts of a web portal. One of this parts includes jQuery UI Datepicker, as inline widget, not popup.</p>
  
  <p>We've searched the web and read around, and on jQuery UI forum as well: posts like <a href="http://forum.jquery.com/topic/new-to-jquery-ui-working-on-datepicker-508-compliance" rel="nofollow">New to JQuery-UI &amp; working on datepicker 508 Compliance</a>, <a href="http://forum.jquery.com/topic/inline-datepicker-cannot-change-month-using-keyboard-tab-will-skip-left-and-right-month-change-buttons" rel="nofollow">Inline datepicker cannot change month using keyboard</a>, <a href="http://forum.jquery.com/topic/jquery-datepicker-key-events-goals" rel="nofollow">JQuery Datepicker - Key events - goals?</a> where people asked about accessibility, or offered to work on it.</p>
  
  <p>We've seen there's an (abandoned?) accessibility-enabled fork/rewrite by kbwood: <a href="https://forum.jquery.com/topic/jquery-ui-datepicker-refactor" rel="nofollow">forum post</a> and <a href="https://github.com/kbwood/jquery-ui" rel="nofollow">source code</a>. That one uses <em>handmade</em> template mechanism. </p>
  
  <p>Then there's a <a href="http://view.jqueryui.com/datepicker/datepicker-rewrite/index.html" rel="nofollow">datepicker rewrite sample</a> that uses jQuery tmpl plugin as template mechanism. This one also has WAI ARIA attributes, but is based on jQuery tmpl plugin, which in turn has been adandoned (we loved this was the official version, it would be almost perfect for us).</p>
  
  <p>Also, jQuery UI 1.9 RC is out and it does not seem to include any big change on this side. So here is my question:</p>
  
  <p><strong>Question</strong><br>
  Do you know what's the most up-to-date point where to start from, if we want to add accessibility? Is there anything already half-baked that we can pick up and keep working on it?</p>
  
  <p>We'd better not start from an abandoned branch, so not to throw everything away on the next jQuery UI update.</p>
  
  <p>Thanks all for your attention</p>