Setting up your browser
All our suggestions to improve the accessibility of web pages
will apply to every site you visit. Please note that they won't
affect images on the screen.
Microsoft Internet Explorer
To apply permanently the font and colour changes below:
- on the View / Tools menu, click Internet Options
- on the General tab, select Accessibility
- click the three boxes to show ticks.
Changing the font
Using a sans serif font (such as Arial), rather than a serif
font (such as Times New Roman) can make text easier to read.
- on the View / Tools menu, click Internet Options
- on the General tab, click Fonts
- in the Proportional and Fixed-width font lists, select the
fonts you would like to use.
Displaying text larger or smaller
- on the View / Tools menu, click Internet Options
- on the General tab, click Fonts
- select the font size you would like.
Changing text and background colour
Website authors and designers often specify particular fonts,
typefaces and background colours for their pages, and the
combinations can sometimes make the text difficult to read. You can
override these settings by choosing your own preferred, clearer
colour scheme - black text on a yellow background gives the most
contrast:
- on the View / Tools menu, click Internet Options
- on the General tab, click Colors
- click on the tick box labelled Use Windows Colors
- click Text, and select the colour you want. Click OK.
- click Background, and select the colour you want to use. Click
OK
To close images on web pages:
- on the View / Tools menu, click Internet Options
- on the Advanced tab, scroll down to Multimedia
- click on Show pictures to remove the tick
- click on Apply, and then click on OK.
To change the size of the window:
- click Full Screen on the toolbar.
There are more options to make websites easier to
read, such as removing animation and expanding text. To look at the
other options:
- on the View / Tools menu, click Internet Options
- select the Advanced tab
- choose the options you would like
Netscape Navigator 4.x
To change the settings on your browser go to the Edit menu,
and click on Preferences. From here you can make the following
changes:
changing the font
- click on Appearance
- click Font
- change the Variable Width Font and the Fixed Width Font to the
type you prefer.
(To use these fonts when you visit all websites in future,
click on Use my default fonts overriding document specified
fonts.)
changing the colour of the text and the
background
- click on Appearance
- click Colours
- select Text, and choose the colour you would like to use
- click OK
- select Background, and choose a colour
- click OK
- click OK to close Preferences
(To use these settings in future, click on Always use my
colours, overriding document.)
to close images on web pages:
- click on Edit
- click Preferences
- select Advanced
- remove the tick from the box marked Automatically load
images
- click OK
If you have any problems changing these settings, please click
the Help menu on the browser toolbar. Also, if your browser has
different options to the above, look at the Help menu for specific
instructions.