Information on the OPM website conforms to guidelines designed to help easy navigation.

The following information will help you understand what standards we have applied to the site and how to deal with certain file types.

Navigation
Site specification
Browser compatibilities
Printing pages
Bookmarking pages
Search
Submitting feedback
Saving pages to your PC
File formats
Maltese characters

Navigation
Each of the pages on this site has a navigation section down the left hand side of the screen. Frames are not used as they can in many cases be more of a hindrance than a help. The links include a description box informing the user where the link will go. This can be viewed by placing the pointer over the line of text.

Site specification
The OPM website has been designed with all users in mind. The standard outline guide for the site was for an SVGA resolution monitor (800 x 600) using 256 colours. The site is quite useable with specifications lower than this.

Browser compatibility
The OPM website has been fully tested on a number of browsers on the majority of existing computer operating systems. OPM uses Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) to format the textual information within each page. Only browsers from version 4 upwards fully understand CSS formatting.

Printing pages
Any page can be printed from the web by the user selecting File, Print from the menu option within Microsoft Internet Explorer or Netscape.

Bookmarking pages
To bookmark a particular page the user selects Favorites, Add to Favorites from the menu option within Microsoft Internet Explorer (IE) or Bookmarks, Add Bookmarks in Netscape.

Searching
To complete a search the user has to enter a word or collection of words into the text search box. Pressing the return key or clicking on the "go" button will present the user with a listing of documents which correspond to the search details. These results will be rated and the most complete matches will be listed first, decreasing in relevance as the user goes further down the list.

Submitting feedback
OPM supplies a feedback form to give users an opportunity to voice their comments on the website itself or on any services provided by OPM departments or units. Once the form has been completed the user must click on the submit button at the bottom of the page. This will forward the information to the Customer Care Coordinator at OPM.

Saving pages
Any page displayed on your browser can be saved to your local drive. Select File, Save as from the menu option within Microsoft IE and Netscape.

File formats
Some files within this site are in PDF (porftable document format) rather than HTML or ASP format. To read PDF files the user requires Adobe Acrobat Reader. This is installed as standard on most machines and will open automatically when the user clicks on a link to a PDF document. However, pages in this site with links to PDF documents also contain a link through which the software can be downloaded at no cost.

Maltese characters
Any Maltese words in the English version of this website do not contain Maltese characters to avoid causing any users problems of incompatibility. In the Maltese pages, Maltese characters are represented using the Unicode system. Unicode is a new international font standard which is based on existing fonts but with a considerably extended character set (including Maltese fonts). New and recent computers are likely to have Unicode fonts installed as standard and can therefore automatically portray Maltese characters in the correct manner. If your computer is not upgraded to this standard, you can download Maltese language support software from the Malta Information Technology and Training Services Ltd. website which also includes some Unicode fonts.