Navigation
Astralsound Menus and Site Structure
You can find an overview of site structure and links to all pages on our Site Map page.
We hope that as well as being W3C compliant, navigating the Astralsound website is reasonably intuitive, and accessible for anyone with appropriate software or device(s) to cater for their individual requirements. If you don't find it accessible yourself, please let us know, and in the light of any suggestions you make we'll do what we can to fix it.
What follows below is a description of how navigation functions operate on this site in most mainstream browsers, which will hopefully clarify anything you do not find as intuitive or accessible as we intended.
Link-formatting in the Illustration Section below is for demonstration only: buttons emulate link-behaviour when hovering over or clicking on them, but they do not link to other pages.
Our site structure, menus and internal links have gone through a number of revisions since the Astralsound website was launched in 2001.
For those navigating the site from a keyboard, all focus points within a page's Main Content section follow visual tab-order. However, the Menu section at the top of each page comes after the Main Content in tab order. For convenience, there are tab-focused links at the beginning of each, so that it isn't necessary to tab through an entire page or menu section to reach the other section.
The main navigation tool is a single expandable (drop-down) menu at the top of every page, allowing direct mouse-access from any open page to any other page. Expansion and selection of sub-menu items from the keyboard isn't currently possible - we're working on it! - as in its present state this would require tabbing through the entire menu-tree before reaching subsequent links. For the time being, therefore, submenu items can only be reached from a keyboard by using the Breadcrumb Menu (see below).
The expandable menu uses only HTML and CSS, and should function correctly for mouse-users in any browser that complies with W3C standards for HTML-5 and CSS-3. Older browsers may not render it correctly, and there are known issues in Internet Explorer 8 or earlier. If you have a browser that is affected we recommend that you update it as soon as possible, as security features in an older browser will be compromised as well as display.
Illustration Section
The Main Menu
In standard browsers using their default settings on most full-sized displays (1024 × 768 or greater), the at the top of each page provides links to the main website sections.
On smaller displays (those with a screen-width less than 768 pixels) navigation is provided a breadcrumb menu (see below).
are denoted by a down-arrow on the Navigation Bar. Each section's menu expands on mouse-over to show the relevant sub-menu(.
A on a sub-menu item indicates that there is a further subsection.
Positioning your cursor over any Navigation Bar or Sub-Menu button highlights that button by darkening the background-colour of that item and - if it is in a sub-menu - its parent(s). Clicking on a selected button, whether or not a subsection menu is also open, takes you to the to the page selected. Button text corresponds closely - in many cases exactly - with a page's subject and/or title.
Menu display and function has been checked in the latest versions of Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera and Safari. If you are using one of these and experience problems with the menu, please let us know. There are known issues in Internet Explorer 8 or earlier, and you may find problems in some older and/or non-standards-compliant browsers. If this affects you we, apologise, but in that case recommend (if only for your security) that you update your browser and/or operating system.
If you cannot get the main menu to display or function correctly using a mouse, or if you are finding navigation of the site difficult for any other reason but have managed to find this page anyway, please let us know (and preferably also tell us which operating system and browser - with version/release numbers - you are/were using).
The Breadcrumb Menu
Immediately below the Navigation Bar is the Breadcrumb Menu, accessible on all devices and in all browsers. On full-width displays this shows:
Parent ► Current Page ► Child-1 - Child-2 - ... - Child-n
with links underlined.
On smaller (e.g. phone) displays, breadcrumb‑menu links are represented by Link-Buttons.
The Search Facility
A search-box at the top of each page acts as a local search engine: when you press the button it returns all pages in the Astralsound website containing the words you have entered, in order of relevance. This uses a local (site-wide) index, and it is possible that recent changes to pages haven't been indexed before your search. Our Events page is a common culprit, so if you're searching for an upcoming event we recommend looking there directly, rather than searching.
Content-Based Links
Where a topic has subsections, main subsection pages are generally linked by Link-Buttons. These are always focusable, and can be activated by mouse-button or the Enter key.
On many pages there are also links within the text to other pages (or to bookmarks on the same page). Links and pop-up tips (for example, definitions of technical terms) are indicated by underlined text and font colour. Links should also be apparent when you pass your cursor over them, although your operating system, browser, and system/browser settings will determine how they become apparent. By default, links to other internal pages open in the current browser window and tab, while links to documents, images, or pages on other sites open in a new tab or window.
We regularly check all internal and external links to make sure they work and lead to relevant pages. Although we cannot accept responsibility for the content of other sites, we don't want to link to any pages that are immoral, illegal, offensive, or even - using euphemism to avoid unwanted traffic - decorative rather than informative. If a link anywhere on this site takes you somewhere you didn't wish or intend to go (whether or not it is decorative), or doesn't function as it should, please let us know.
Pop-Ups
On a number of pages there are pop-up dialogs and images. All these dialogs and images can be focused using the Tab or Shift+Tab keys, and opened using a mouse-button or the Enter key. They can be closed by clicking or pressing Enter on the (tab-focused) cross in the top right-hand corner, by clicking anywhere outside the pop-up box, or by using the Escape key
The Footer Menu
At the bottom of each page is a link to the top of that page, and beneath this are links to the head pages of each main section.
End of Illustration Section