Navigation

There are several methods of navigating the site, including the main menu (covered below), a crumb trail, drop down menu navigation and previous/next links within subcategories, a site map, and a supporting menu in the page footers. (In addition, the site provides search facilities.)

There were three principle aims with navigation design for the site:

1. Accessibility - a system as navigable as possible for people with all abilities.
2. No matter where you are in the site, anywhere else in the site should be reachable within two clicks at most.
3. Choice - providing options for the visitor.

Of course, the purpose of navigation systems on any website is to allow the user to get around the site easily and find the information they're after. It's hoped that the consistency and the options available will enable all visitors to do just that, but if you have any problems or comments then your feedback will always be appreciated.

Main menu

The main top of page menu is constructed using Brothercake's Ultimate Drop Down Menu (UDM) system.

A drop-down menu was imperative for aim 2 (above) to be possible, but writing reliable drop-down menus is no easy task. After consideration we decided to examine commercially available systems, and finally chose UDM. It's a superb piece of work.

Providing excellent cross-browser support, it's a drop down menu built using the XHTML/CSS principles that the new PC Technology Guide design adopted. Not only that, it stands out from the crowd because of the clear ongoing commitment to development of the product, and also the excellent accessibility focus.

A superb feature of the Brothercake system is the keyboard enabled navigation. Using the tab button you can access the menu, including the drop-down sections. Repeatedly pressing tab will move through each item in sequence, and shift-tab will reverse through the sequence. If this is taking too long, to shortcut through the items the keyboard arrow keys will also work for moving through the menu options, overall providing a very simple and accessible site navigation method.

Although the Brothercake menu does require JavaScript to be enabled in order to work properly, the site has been developed in such a way that all pages can be reached through introductory pages, and the site map backs up as a site-wide navigation system.