This site is designed to help people using screen readers (and also text-only browsers) to navigate easily through the site. The design includes some Features which may not be familiar to all our visitors. Additionally, every page is divided into Page Areas using a consistent format - so you can be sure that what works on one page will work on the others. (This Guide is the only page which has a different structure!)
You can return to the page you arrived here from by using these links to either the Home Page or the Site Design and Accessibility Features Page.
If you need to read this page again, you can access it either from the Home Page or from the Site Design Page. The Home Page is accessible from the Main Menu on every page. The Site Design Page is accessible in the Page Footer on every page.
Jump links (or internal or fragment links) move you to a different part of the current page. They are useful for menus for parts of the current page. Most browsers support them. Anyone using an older or restricted browser will unfortunately not be able to use this feature.
Keyboard shortcuts (hotkeys, access keys) enable you to use the keyboard to activate often repeated functions. They're widely used in software: e.g. in Word on a Windows machine, holding the "Control" key down and then keying "S" will Save a document, without having to use the menu.
On this site several common functions have been given shortcuts which are listed below. The shortcut takes you to the relevant link, but does not activate it. To activate it (moving the browser to the right place), press "Return".
This feature is not supported by all browsers, and sometimes erratically on those that do at this time. However, try it - nothing bad should happen! (If it does, we need your comments.) The feature is most useful for visitors who come back often enough to make it worth remembering the shortcuts. (Other sites, if they use shortcuts, will have different ones.)
Note: the following ALT + key combinations assume you are using Windows. If you are using a Macintosh, use CONTROL istead. For other systems, please refer to your system's Help.
On all pages:-
On the Newsletters pages:-
On the Home Page and Site Design Page:-
And on this page only:-
If you decide to set your browser up so that graphics are not loaded, what happens? Nothing, except the pages should load faster. The only graphics which are important for information are the location maps for the SRSB and Cairn Home. You can always switch the graphics back on again. In any case, all graphics have a text description.
Every page is split up into the same six areas. You can either read all of the descriptions in order or dip into individual areas. The links in the following list will take you to the relevant section. To come back to this list use the "return to areas list" link available at the end of each section.
Every page has three of these. These links are all jump links with keyboard shortcuts. They jump to the Main Menu, the Local Menu or the Page Content of the current page. The Home page which has a fourth link, the extra one leading to this page. These links are reproduced exactly as they usually appear except for size and border, but trying to follow them on this page may be disorientating as it doesn't have normal layout. (These links are not normally visible to people using visual browsers, all they would see here is a space.)
The Page Header consists of graphics which contribute to the visual design (all have meaningful text replacements), our charity number and our founding date. The Page Header is as follows.
The site is split up into seven groups of pages. The Main Menu gives you access to these groups in exactly the same way across all pages. The links in the following menu work exactly the same as they do elsewhere, so if you follow them, you'll have to use your browser's "Back" feature to return to this page.
All pages have a Local Menu: its content is relevant to that page. The links in the menu are grouped according to what they lead to. There are four different groupings, only relevant ones are used on each page. The groups are as follows:-
The content of each page starts with its own title. Text and sub-headings as used as appropriate. On most pages the sub-headings can be reached from the Local Menu. So if you know what you're interested in you don't have to read the whole page to find it.
At the end of the content on every page there is a "top of page" link. There is also one of these at the end of every sub-section mentioned in a Local Menu. Please note that the top is the very start of the page, not the top of the content. This way you will be able to use the screen reader navigation links immediately. The "top of page" links are all identical and can be accessed from anywhere on any page using the keyboard shortcut 4. (The Page Features section above has details about keyboard shortcuts.)
We've prepared an example of page content, if you want to check out a short demonstration.
The Page Footer is almost identical on every page. It consists of 6 items.
The exception to this layout is the Home Page. There is an extra section at the end of this footer with some graphics relating to the design standards of the site. There is a link to the Site Design page there as well.
This page has a real Page Footer at the end of the Guide! At the end of the Page Footer there is a jump link to bring you to the start of the next section.
Please send any comments about either this Guide or the Site to webmaster@srsb.org.uk.
End of Guide.
Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind
“Supporting Blind & Partially Sighted People in Sheffield”
Davy Markham Works
Prince of Wales Road
Darnall
Sheffield
S9 4DZ
Registered Charity Number 1047257
Telephone: 0114 244 6164
E-mail: info@srsb.org.uk
Websites: www.srsb.org.uk
Page last checked on 07/06/2007.
© 2001-2002 Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind
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