What is @UK PLC?Accessibility
Accessibility for all users is an ongoing challenge as site designers balance the needs of old browsers, new browsers, mobile users and specialized browsers such as text readers, used by partially sighted visitors.What are @UK doing?
@UK has invested a great deal of time and resource in this area already, and plan to continue this work across the system.
We strive to make our sites accessible to everyone – if you spot a particular problem that you think we should know about please contact us.
Through automation and content management it is possible to enforce a level of compliance throughout the system which means that all our member sites can be compliant as well as our main site.
The Disability Discrimination Act
The W3C guidelines are widely regarded as an acceptable benchmark for showing that a company has taken steps to make their site accessible.
W3C's "Web Content Accessibility Guidelines 1.0", are available at http://www.w3.org/TR/1999/WAI-WEBCONTENT-19990505
For existing pages we are taking reasonable measures to ensure that our pages conform to Level A.
For all new pages, as of 2006 we will be taking reasonable measures to ensure that our pages conform to Level AA (EU recommended level).
Examples of features we are introducing;
- validated markup
- meaningful ALT text for any image icons
- descriptive hyperlink text
- contrasting background colors behind text (where used)
- easy to read non-serif font types
- CSS design - enabling user controlled font size
- liquid layout
- consistent navigation
Access Keys
Having taken professional advice we have taken the decision not offer access key shortcuts.
As there is no convention for access keys it is highly likely that the access keys specified on a site will conflict with keyboard commands already in use by some browsers or assistive technologies. This may particularly lead to important browser functionality no longer working.
Further Reading about access keys.
Compatibility
We also endeavour to test all our pages on various screen sizes (down to 800x600) and on different platforms, to ensure that our pages are accessible to all our visitors.
However to be absolutely sure you are getting the best possible format make sure you are running the latest version of your chosen browser.
Disabled or disadvantaged users we'd like your feedback please! - let us know what you think of the site by emailing the Design Team from the contact page.