Web Site Accessibility Guidelines


De La Salle University strives to make its web site accessible to all users, including people who are vision impaired, have hearing, physical, cognitive and neurological disabilities. This is an on-going activity to reach the widest audience possible. If you have any questions or comments about the accessibility of this site, please e-mail webmaster@dlsu.edu.ph.


Access Keys

An access key is an assigned keyboard shortcut used with hot keys in web sites. In the DLSU-Manila web site, you may use these for easier navigation. For example, if you are a Windows© Internet Explorer© user, you may press ALT + 1 + ENTER to go to the home page. The hot keys may also be used with other Web browsers and computer platforms.

Hot Keys

Keys Functions
1 Home page
2 Skip to content
3 Quick search
4 My.LaSalle log-in page
5 Web accessibility statement (this page)
? Help page

To navigate through different sections of the site:

Keys Functions
6 Header navigation
7 (Reserved for flash banner menu navigation)
8 Sub-header navigation
9 Section menu navigation
0 Footer menu navigation

You may also use the TAB key to jump from link to link and press the ENTER key to activate them.

To use the hot/access keys, for Windows:

Browser  
Internet Explorer ALT + access key + ENTER
Mozilla/Firefox ALT + access key
Firefox 2 ALT + SHIFT + access key
(to change settings)
Netscape/Gecko ALT + access key
Opera SHIFT + ESC + <release> + access key

For Macintosh:

Browser  
Internet Explorer CTRL + access key + RETURN
Mozilla/Firefox CTRL + access key
Netscape/Gecko CTRL + access key
Opera SHIFT + ESC + <release> + access key

On Linux platform:

Browser  
Mozilla/Firefox ALT + access key
Netscape/Gecko ALT + access key
Opera SHIFT + ESC + <release> + access key

Reserved Keys

Keys Function
F File
E Edit
V View
G Go (for Mozilla/Firefox only)
B Bookmark (for Mozilla, Firefox and Opera)
A Favorites (for Internet Explorer only)
T Tools
H Help

In combination with the key ALT (Windows), CTRL (Macintosh), SHIFT + ESC (Opera), the underlined letter in the browser menu may also be used to perform certain functions:

Keys Function
P View printer-friendly version
S Advanced search
I Search by Google
M Site map
O (Reserved for Offices/Contacts)
K Feedback
N DLSUNet usage policy
D Disclaimer
R Copyright & IPR information
U (Reserved)
W E-mail webmaster
Q About this site
X Check the validity of the page's source code (XHTML)
Y Check the validity of the page's stylesheet (CSS)

 

Standards Compliance

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an international consortium which aims to lead the Web to its full potential to make human communication, commerce and opportunities to share knowledge available to all people no matter what hardware, software, network infrastructure, physical or mental ability.

The Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) used in this web site were validated by the W3C. All pages were also validated as XHTML 1.0 Strict. These validations ensure the pages’ readability and presentation across different browsers.

Screen Readers


  1. Many links have title attributes. This makes the site easier to navigate and the information easier to find.
  2. To help the users who extract a list of all the links on the page and browse it separately from the content, links were written to make sense out of context. Browsers such as JAWS, Home Page Reader, Lynx and Opera have this function.
  3. Link text is always unique. Two links with the same link text always point to the same address.

Images

All images have short descriptions. These are called descriptive ALT tags.

Visual Design


  1. This site uses cascading style sheets for visual layout.
  2. If your browser or browsing device does not support styles sheets at all, the content of each page is still readable.

Accessibility Software


  1. JAWS, a time-limited downloadable screen reader
  2. Home Page Reader, a time-limited downloadable screen reader
  3. Lynx, a free text-only web browser for the blind with refreshable Braille displays
  4. Links, a free, text-only web browser for visual users with low bandwidth
  5. Opera, a downloadable visual browser with accessibility features such as text zooming, user style sheets and image toggle. This is compatible with Windows, Macintosh, and Linux operating systems, among others.

Accessibility Services


  1. World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
  2. Watchfire, a free service that checks the compliance of web pages to accessibility guidelines
  3. HTML Validator, a free service that checks the conformance of web pages to published HTML standards
  4. Lynx viewer, a service that shows the views of web pages in Lynx
  5. WDG HTML Validator, a free service that uses third-party PERL modules and other programs to support a wide range of character encodings

Firefox 2 Settings

To change back the hot/access key to ALT + access key stroke combination:


  1. In Firefox 2 browser address bar, type/enter about:config (without http://).This will show all the browser's configuration preferences.
  2. In the Filter field, under the tab/s, type ui.key.generalAccessKey.
  3. Double-click on the result, change the given integer value -1, to 18 and test it again. There is no need to restart your browser.

References:


Related Resources


  1. Philippine Web Accessibility Group (PWAG), a non-stock, non-profit association of web designers and advocates of web accessibility. Its mission is to "teach and promote web accessibility in the Philippines as a method of making information accessible to all".
  2. Section 508 requires that Federal agencies' electronic and information technology is accessible to people with disabilities.
  3. WebAIM, a non-profit organization dedicated to improving accessibility to online learning materials.
  4. Designing More Usable Web Sites, a comprehensive list of additional resources.
  5. Vision Office Support Services, a pioneering advocate of accessible information and communications technology (ICT) for all, including persons with disabilities.