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Content:
Accessibility
MSO Home - Site Info - Accessibility
Even though the amount of fancy things you can do with the internet keeps on growing, there is an increasing awareness for the users who aren't able to see all these flashing lights and moving images. Motorway Services Online sticks to the basics as it tries to be as accessible as possible to everyone: whether you're using a brand new PC or a three-year-old mobile phone. On this page you can read about some of the measures that have been implemented to try and make browsing the internet better for everyone.
Contents:
- Site Layout
- Keyboard Shortcuts (Access Keys)
- Images
- Abbreviations
- Links
- Exceptions and Inaccessible Pages
- Your Say
Site Layout
The site tries to be as simple as possible, which also helps to speed it up a bit. A lot of the design is controlled by an external stylesheet, and if your browser doesn't support stylesheets then the site has been designed to 'collapse'. If you head over to AnyBrowser.com
you will be able to see what the 'collapsed' version looks like (a small amount of which is pictured to the right). This is to make using the site on a non-visual browser much easier.
You may have also noticed that Motorway Services Online doesn't use any adverts, pop-ups* or pop-unders, I hate them just as much as you do. The code which Motorway Services Online uses also tries to be as valid as possible, and you can click on one of these buttons for more information on the relevant subject:
![[Valid RSS]](/images/valid-rss.png "Validate my RSS feed"){kind=small}
Keyboard Shortcuts (Access Keys)
You may not know this, but many of the main and well-linked to pages on this site have little shortcuts to allow you to reach them more easily. This is particularly useful if you struggle with a mouse, however most users can benefit from them by pressing 'Alt' and one of these keys:
Please note that the real links to the first two options are hidden to most users and the first one will only work properly in a non-visual browser, it's all to do with the 'collapsed' site layout addressed above. And yes, I know that some of the links between the letters and the pages are very tenuous!
Page: | Shortcut: |
| Skip to content | X |
| Accessibility (this page) | H (for help) |
| Site homepage | 0 (zero) |
| List of Services | S |
| Operators | O |
| Brands | B |
| Unbuilt Services | U |
| Misc MSAs | M |
| Links | L |
| Message Boards | F (for Forums) |
| Site Info | I |
| Contact | C |
| Site Map | T (Site) |
| Back to top ^ | P (Top) |
Images
When creating this site I have tried to strike a balance between plain and tedious and slow and busy with regards to images. I have tried to keep them all at a sensible size as well, and all picture thumbnails are completley new files rather than the full one shrunk a bit, this means that people won't have to wait for the full image to load if they don't even want to look at the thumbnail.
Except for the photos in the Services List and Operators sections, it is possible for a reader to get just as much out of the site whether their browser allows images or not - most of the ones used on the site, such as the one displayed on this page, are just pretty extras. Finally, if you do allow images but find that the internet or just this website alone loads slowly for you, all image sizes are pre-defined. This means that until the image has loaded, a placeholder of its size will be used, meaning that the page won't jump around as your browser gradually downloads the full image.
Abbreviations
Motorway Services Online tries to avoid using technical terms and abbreviations, but if one does crop up and it would not read well for a definition to be written next to it, the word may well be underlined by a dotted grey line, and if so you can place your cursor over it to see a definition or explanation. Try it with the example above!
Links
The links on this site should be fairly obvious - blue words which turn red and underlined when you place your cursor over them - there are plenty of them on this page for you to experiment with. Like images, you will find that all links open in the same window as the one you are using, with the exception of the 'bookmark us' link found on the top-right of this page. If you want a certain link to open in a new window, you can right-click on it and select "open link in new window", "open link in a new tab" or press 'ctrl' when you click on it, whichever option you prefer.
Links to external websites will often be marked by this image: , and clicking on it will also open the link in a new window. If you were to place your cursor over a link to an external website you will find the words "External Link", followed by the name of the website it links to. This is particularly useful if you're not sure whether a certain link points to a different website or not, or if the page doesn't otherwise state what the name of the external website is.
Exceptions and Inaccessible Pages
Generally, you should find that whatever your browser, almost all pages of Motorway Services Online are accessible to you. The two exceptions which I am aware of are:
- Any of the photo galleries. Obviously, it would be pretty pointless if you were to try and use them when your browser doesn't allow images, but each photo has an 'alt' tag, a 'title' tag and a caption, so using them is possible.
- PDF files. They are a special format which is useful for displaying booklets or anything which is designed to be printed off, although it can sometimes be slow and it requires the free, safe and popular Acrobat Reader to work (most people already have it and don't know about it). PDF is only used three times on this site: one for each of the downloadable maps.
Your Say
No-one knows how you use the internet better than you do. Please do let me know how you're viewing the site, any problems you may have encountered and any suggestions you have to improve the accessibility of Motorway Services Online.
Oh, and one last thing, I use Mozilla Firefox both to run this site and to surf the web generally, and I would highly recommend that you do the same.
* - Registered members of Motorway Services Online may receive a pop-up to announce when they have received a private message in their account, however you can opt in and out of this and other methods of announcement by logging in and clicking 'user control panel' on the top, selecting 'board preferences' under 'options' and then by setting 'pop up window on new private message' to their preferred option.