tabs: When the selectedIndex is changed, if focus is on a tab, focus should move to the now-selected tab

Bug, feature request, or proposal:

When the selectedIndex property of an MdTabGroup is changed so that another tab is opened, if the focus is on a tab within the MdTabGroup’s tab header, focus should move to the now-selected tab.

Alternatively, I would like the MdTabGroup’s tab header child component to be exposed so that I could update the focusIndex.

What is the current behavior?

Currently, when the selectedIndex is changed to open a different tab while the focus is on one of the tabs, focus remains on the tab.

What are the steps to reproduce?

Please see this Plunker: http://plnkr.co/edit/xNUO08jgFcFCsdWDzCRZ

In this Plunker, I integrated a Material Design tabs component with routing, so that clicking on a tab changes the URL, and visiting a certain tab’s URL will cause the tab to be opened.

1. Run the Plunker that I linked to. Click the “Launch the preview in a separate window” button to see the changing URLs.
2. When you see the tabs rendered, click on “Tab 3” to open the third tab.
3. Right click on “Tab 3” and select “Back” from the context menu (in Firefox, the “back” menu item is just an arrow icon).
4. The blue tab underline will move to “Tab 1” and the first tab will be opened; however, the focus is still on “Tab 3”.

What is the use-case or motivation for changing an existing behavior?

I would like to be able to move the focus to the now-selected tab.

Which versions of Angular, Material, OS, browsers are affected?

Angular 2.3.1, Angular Material 2.0.0-beta.1

I have tested Safari 10.0.3, Firefox 51.0.1 (64-bit), and Chrome 56.0.2924.87 (64-bit).

Is there anything else we should know?

See this thread on JavaRanch for some background: https://coderanch.com/t/675876/access-grandchild-component-Angular

[antonmoiseev]

A picture is worth a thousand words 😉

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