Improve the admin bar focus style

[afercia]

Trac ticket: https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/65445

Use of AI Tools

None

This is a Proof Of Concept to improve the focus style on the admin bar.
See attached video recording to illustrate.
Comments on the Trac ticket.

Screen.Recording.2026-06-15.at.13.34.27.mov

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[afercia]

This should be double checked. I have no idea why the last item in a menu was supposed to not use a box-shadow. Had to remove it otherwise the new focus style wouldn't work.

[joedolson]

I did some exploring, but I couldn't see any good reason for it, either. I thought it could be a leftover from some older styles, but couldn't find evidence of that. It's old; been there since at least 3.3.

[sabernhardt]

I do not know of a reason to keep it either (otherwise, the specificity could be reduced).

r19328 added the box-shadow rule(s).

• At that time, admin-bar.dev.css only added a box-shadow for the flyout submenu containers and the shortlink input, neither of which would be an li element or have the .ab-item class.
• I did not find any mention of this :last-child box-shadow on the six tickets referenced in the commit message. Images below comment 29 on ticket 18197 show a shadow on the W logo, which would not be the last item in a list. The admin-bar-show-right-border-with-custom-menu.diff patch has a :last-child selector, but that relates to the search input.
• r26072 removed border-right: 0 but kept box-shadow: none.

[joedolson]

There are a couple of changes in here not strictly related to the focus styles (e.g., the fixed height of text in the profile menu), but IMO those are fine to include.

[sabernhardt]

I like this overall, but it still should have a few changes.

[sabernhardt]

Changing the line-height is good.

However, the height gave some space between the username and "Edit Profile" (if the username does not match the display name). To preserve that design, the span elements could have a min-height of 18px.

If the separation is unimportant, at least the small line-height should be removed for narrower screens. The negative margin seems fine with "editor" as the username, but it is probably better to remove that for characters with descenders. (The screenshots below do not include a min-height.)

[sabernhardt]

The currentColor has a conflict on narrower screens for core links with icons attached to .ab-item::before. Removing the old rule should fix it.

• r26134 added #999 for .ab-item in the 'my-sites' and 'site-name' nodes on small screens.
• r36587, one of the commits that edited the color value, questioned why the color rule was necessary.
• The colors.css stylesheets use #wpadminbar.nojq .quicklinks .ab-top-menu > li > .ab-item:focus, so plugins such as "View Admin As" would display the correct color even though they have their icon on the ::before pseudo-element.
• Yoast Duplicate Post defines #999 as the color, and that would need updating.

[sabernhardt]

Core is not perfectly consistent about the leading zero, but it is in the coding standards.

Suggested change

	transition: box-shadow .1s linear;
	transition: box-shadow 0.1s linear;