News - Portal to be open to everyone

Portal to be open to everyone

September 2002

The current gateway to government - New Zealand Government Online - is already one of the most visited sites in New Zealand. So reaching a wide audience has always been at the top of list for the portal designers.

The portal design has followed the e-government guidelines for website design to remove many barriers to access. Barriers can come in many shapes and sizes.

Many people use computers that don’t run the latest browsers; or don’t know or don’t want to know how to install them, even if they could. Some people use assistive technology to overcome a physical disability - a far cry from the standard preinstalled browsers most of us use. Others, particularly in rural areas, may have poor Internet connections that load pages too slowly to make some sites usable.

All these considerations have gone into the design of the soon to be launched government portal.

The portal will look different because it is different. It won’t carry a lot of branding or slow-to-download graphics, like commercial sites looking to build market share. The emphasis will be on information that is easy to read and understand, whoever you are, with links that take you quickly to the services you need.

However, site designs are never finished. As technology and people's expectations change, we’ll methodically revise the way the portal looks and works.