Accessibility
On this page you can find out about:
The website conforms to the following standards:
Valid CSS | Valid XHTML 1.1 | W3C WAI Double A Complaint
This website is enabled for speech with BrowseAloud. BrowseAloud is a great (and free for the end user) piece of software that works alongside the web site to deliver audible feedback to users with visual impairments or other learning difficulties such as dislexia. BrowseAloud has been tested on this site and is active on a temporary trial basis, so that we can gauge how useful our viewers may find it.
You can download the BrowseAloud software for free here.
Alternatives to BrowseAloud include Jaws and Window Eyes which are sadly not free.
PDF (Portable Document Format)
Some pages on this website are in PDF format, these are usually leaflets or forms for you to download/print and view later offline. The PDF files are compatible with Adobe Reader 5 and above and are made as accessible as possible. PDF's are like other links on the website except that they also include the following at the end of the link: [PDF]. The speed of download depends on your internet connection speed, but should be no longer than 5 minutes for the biggest file sizes.
If you do not already have the software to view these files please download the adobe reader software here.
On some versions of adobe reader you can have the PDF document read out to you by doing the following in sequence:
*
Hold down shift and ctrl and press Y then B
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Changing colours
Changing the site's background colour can be particularly useful for users who rely on magnification technology as white can produce an uncomfortable glare. It is also possible to change the colour of body text on the site. Both can be achieved by changing preferences in your browser:
If you use Microsoft Internet Explorer, go to the Tools menu, select Internet Options, select Accessibility, and put a tick in the box next to "Ignore colors specified on web pages", then select OK. Now go to Colors (colours), select Colors and make changes to text and background colours in the Colors panel.
If you use Netscape Navigator, go to the Edit menu, select Preferences, open the Appearance menu and select Colors. You can set the colour of text and background from here.
If you use Opera, go to the File menu select Preferences, open the 'page style' (under fonts and colours). Ensure 'user mode' options use own settings (default settings). Now go into fonts and colours and you can change the colour options. Select 'View' then select 'Style' then select 'user mode'.
If you using Firefox, go to Tools, select options. A box will appear, now select 'General' untick 'use system colours'. Now you can change the background and text colour on our website and any other website which supports this.
You may also set your own style sheet if you have one available, an example of this using explorer would be to go to 'tools', 'Internet options' 'accessibility' then select 'format documents using my style sheet'. This allows you to specify your own colours and text size. We will soon have more than one style sheet available for our visitors so please be patient while we develop this feature.
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Navigation
Our navigation bar features an organised site split into logical sections. You can access each section at any point by clicking the menu item. If you wish to return to the previous page, your internet browser has a useful "back" button to return to where you were.
Much of our web site has interactive text ( or "hyperlinks" as the geeks like to call them!) contained in the headers or page paragraphs. They will always be a different colour to the standard text, so that users can distinguish between what's clickable and what isn't. These links enable you to quickly jump to a specific piece of information or link to external web site.
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The search facility
Located at the top right of every page on ChesterTogether.co.uk and partner sites is our search bar. Enter the phrase that you would like to search for into the search box, then click 'Search' or press "Enter". This function will then crawl the ChesterTogether server for data that contains those particular terms. After a short while you will be presented with your search results.
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Text size
Some users may find that the website font is too small. Indeed, some find it too big! The size of the text can be made bigger or smaller in a number of ways. The easiest way is to use your browser by going to the Tools menu, then select 'text size' or 'text zoom' or 'zoom' and increase the size of the text.
Alternatively (using keyboard shortcuts):
On Microsoft Internet Explorer
Hold Alt + V
Then press X followed by Return (Enter)
On Netscape
Hold Alt + V
Then press Z followed by 0 (zero) (or replace the 0 with 2 for extra large text)
On Opera
Hold Alt + V
Then press Z followed by 0 (zero). Opera also allows you to press the + and - on the keypad to increase and decrease the size respectively.
On Firefox
Hold 'control' and press the + and - on the keypad to increase and decrease the size respectively
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Text translation
Some users may wish to translate the text on a page to their desired language. This is possible with the Google Translate tool. Learn more about it here...
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