How to Access Your Web Site Like a Blind User

There are many reasons people may visit your web page without actually visually "seeing" your design. Search engines only "read" your text. Blind or visually impaired users may have devices that read your text aloud. And some people surf the web by utilizing options such as setting images not to show, because they take so long to download, especially those with dial-up. It's good to know what such users find when they visit your site. You want them to be able to use your content.

Instructions

Difficulty: Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• Possible helpful tools:
• A Lynx Viewer or Lynx browser
• A Firefox browser with Web Developer Toolbar
• An Opera browser
• Text to Speech tools

1. Give your URL and click View Page. There is a text only browser called Lynx. You can download and install it and use it to navigate your websites. If you don't want to install another browser, there is an available tool called Lynx Viewer that simulates the results of using a Lynx browser.
   
   To use Lynx Viewer, simply provide the URL of any page you want to check and click View Page. (See image)
2. Use the Web Developer Toolbar to disable all CSS Styles. In Firefox, the first step is to use the Web Developer Toolbar to disable CSS. Select CSS > Disable Styles > All Styles.
3. Use the Web Developer Toolbar to disable all images. Also using the Firefox Web Developer Toolbar, select Images > Disable Images > All Images.
4. After using Step 2 and Step 3 with the Firefox Web Developer Toolbar, there should be nothing much left of your page except the structured text and menus that a person using a text only browser or an assistive device like a screen reader could access.
   
   This is also what the search engines read. They don't read your beautiful design or layout. They just read your text.
5. Opera allows you to view a page in User Mode. You can do a similar process with the Opera browser. This only works if you don't have a user style sheet on your computer that you use to override the styles put on a page by the author of the page.
   
   Select View > Styles > User Mode. Since you have no user styles, you should see a plain text page with no style. This will help you realize what a text-only user would be getting from your page.
6. Another really instructive exercise you can do with your web pages is to listen to your page. With Text to Speech software and Firefox (Windows only) or AbleReader (Mac) you can hear your page read aloud.
   
   If you turn off your monitor and try to navigate and use your web page just by listening, you're sure to have an enlightening experience, telling you how accessible and usable your page really is.