Access for Everyone

Website design is often a compromise between visual design and accessible function. Meaning that the most accessible sites can often look quite dull, and the most visually-striking sites lack accessibility. The new StopGAP site makes no such compromises.

Page Layout

One of the most important elements in designing an accessible site is the actual layout of the pages. Magazines and newspapers set out their text in columns as this is easier to read than scanning across a whole page. However, with a website the width of the page can be anything from the width of a mobile phone screen to that of a High-Definition widescreen monitor.

With this in mind, the StopGAP website has been designed to detect what device it's being viewed on and change accordingly. So whether you are using a phone or hand-held touch-screen device, a small or large monitor, or printing-out pages, you should find the text easy to read and the layout easy to follow.

Visibility

You can further change the size of text and images by clicking one of the large 'A' buttons, at the top of the screen, this also includes the option to invert the text and background colours for higher visibility. In addition to this, images can be further enlarged by simply clicking on them.

Users of screen reading software, such as Emacspeak and Jaws, should also find the site layout easy to follow and the image descriptions informative. In addition, they should be able to navigate every page in sequence using the 'Next Page' and 'Previous Page' Quick-Keys.

The Science Bit...

The secret behind all of this is simply the use of internationally standardised web design code. By using Strict HTML 4, combined with CSS 2.1, we're able to most accurately determine, and change using different Stylesheets, how the site will appear in different browsers and on different computers, as well as other devices. For more information about this, you can click one of the Icons at the bottom of the page to visit the 'W3C website'.

Navigation

The StopGAP site makes use of a single-click navigation system, which allows users to access every page on the site from every page on the site. Although there is still a detailed 'Sitemap' page for users who prefer this method of navigation.

Access Keys

Access Keys allow users to easily navigate websites without a mouse. The way to use Access Keys depends on which browser you are using, so you may need to check, but the main browsers operate as follows:

PC Users
Internet Explorer – Hold down the 'Alt' key whilst pressing the relevant Access Key followed by the 'Return' key.
Mozilla Firefox – Hold down the 'Alt' and 'Shift' keys whilst pressing the relevant Access Key.

Mac Users
Safari and Firefox – Hold down the 'CTRL' key whilst pressing the relevant Access Key.

An index of Access Keys for the StopGAP site is as follows:

 1 – Home page.
 2 – Skip to the main content of the current page.
 3 – Sitemap page.
 4 – Skip to the Search box.
 9 – Contact Us page.
 0 – Accessibility information (this page).
 x – Next page (as listed in the Sitemap).
 b – Previous page (as listed in the Sitemap).

If you have any comments or feedback regarding accessibility or even accessible features you'd like to see on the site, please visit the 'Contact Us' page and let us know.