Accessibility help
We have made every effort to make our website accessible and easy to use for everyone, no matter what browser you choose to use, and whether or not you have any disabilities.
The buttons at the top right of the site allow you to customise the PhoneAbility website to suit your preferences. You can choose between yellow text on a black background, black text on a white background or to just increase the font size. However, if you would prefer, you can find out more about changing your browser settings below.
Changing your browser settings
Changing font size
A lot of web pages can be difficult to view because the text is too small to comfortably read.
Choose from the following Windows web browsers for step-by-step instructions on how to increase the size of the text on any web page you are viewing. (Note these links lead to the BBC My Web My Way website and will open in another window).
Making text larger in Firefox 1.5 / 2
Making text larger in Firefox before version 1.5
Making text larger in Internet Explorer 7
Making text larger in Internet Explorer 5 / 6
Making text larger in Netscape
Making text larger in Opera 8 / 9
Making text larger in Opera 6 / 7
Change text and background colour
Some people find certain text and background colour combinations difficult to read, while others prefer to always have a specific colour such as white text on a black background. In either case it is easy to set your own colours.
Choose from the following Windows web browsers to change text and background colours. (Note these links lead to the BBC My Web My Way website and will open in another window).
Changing colours in Firefox 1.5 / 2
Changing colours in Firefox before version 1.5
Changing colours in Internet Explorer 7
Changing colours in Internet Explorer 5 / 6
Changing colours in Opera 8 / 9
Changing colours in Opera 6 / 7
Enabling sound
There are a number of text to speech programs that are commercial, freeware or shareware that allow any text that can be selected with the keyboard or mouse to be spoken back in a range of different voices.
Make your computer talk with Windows Narrator
Narrator is a Text-to-Speech utility that reads what is displayed on your screen: the contents of the active window, menu options, or the text that you type.
Narrator is designed to work with the Notepad, WordPad, Control Panel programs, Microsoft Internet Explorer, the Windows desktop, and Windows Setup. Narrator is not available for all languages and is only supported on the English version of Windows XP and Windows Vista.
To start Narrator:
Open the ' Start ' menu by clicking on the ' Start ' button or by pressing the Windows logo key (located between the Ctrl and Alt keys on most keyboards), alternatively press ' Ctrl ' + ' Esc '.
Click on 'All Programs' or alternatively press 'P' on the keyboard until All Programs is highlighted and then press 'Enter'.
Click on 'Accessories' or press 'A' on the keyboard until ' Accessories ' is highlighted and then press ' Enter '.
Click on 'Accessibility' or if you are using the keyboard, it will already be highlighted so just press 'Enter'.
Click on 'Narrator' or press 'N' until 'Narrator' is highlighted and then press 'Enter'.
The 'Microsoft Narrator' window will then appear and 'Narrator' immediately starts talking and reads out the instructions on how to use this feature.
After clicking on the 'OK' button or pressing 'Enter', another window appears which has various options which you can select by clicking on the checkbox or tabbing to the checkbox and pressing the 'Spacebar'. You can also adjust the voice settings from here by clicking on the 'Voice' button or pressing 'V' on the keyboard.
Freeware text to speech readers
Please note that inclusion in this list does not in any way imply an endorsement or recommendation from PhoneAbility.
NaturalReader http://www.naturalreaders.com/download.htm
Text2Speech http://www.adamberent.com/Text2Speech.html
TTSReader http://www.sphenet.com/TTSReader/index.htm
More resources
Microsoft publishes detailed information on the accessibility features of the Internet Explorer web browsers and other Microsoft software.
Internet Explorer 6: http://www.microsoft.com/enable/products/ie6/default.aspx
Internet Explorer 7: http://www.microsoft.com/enable/products/IE7/default.aspx
More detailed information about how to change the colours in your operating system and web browser, changing the mouse pointer and using the keyboard instead of the mouse is available online at BBC My Web My Way.
More detailed instructions on setting up Narrator can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/enable/training/windowsxp/usingnarrator.aspx