Antti Koivisto wrote:
I'd like to propose a new <input> type attribute value for phone numbers (<input type="phonenumber"> perhaps). The primary benefit would be to enable use of phone number specific input methods (for example a virtual keyboard) and pickers (for example a system address book). A useful minimal implementation could limit the allowed characters to those legal in phone numbers (+ * # and 0-9).
A brief look around shows the following characters also commonly used in phone numbers as people actually type them in the US: ' ' (ascii space), '.', '-', 'x' (this last in cases like "1-800-123-4567 x235").
This last case in particular is one I would suspect involves a good bit of regional variability; I doubt the Latin lowercase 'x' is used throughout the world to denote extensions.
-Boris
