- Accessibility - Design Standards - Disclaimers - Finding What You Need - Document Formats - Multimedia.

Accessibility

The following 3 Access Keys have been enabled mainly for use with Screen Readers and PDAs:

Access Key M
Brings you to the start of the common menu bar (tab once to go to the French Language button, tab twice to go to the "Contact Us" button, etc.).

Access Key 1
Skips the common menu bar and brings you to the sub-navigation links (these links are more specific to the Web page you are on).

Access Key 2
Skips all menus and takes you directly to the content of the page.

Please note that Access Keys work differently in different browsers, and different keys are used in different platforms. For example, Internet Explorer uses "ALT" M - since "ALT" is a Microsoft standard for Access Keys, other platform use different keys altogether.

Design Standards

The Finance Canada WWW site has been designed for use with MS Internet Explorer version 4 or more recent and Netscape version 4.7 or more recent. It has been designed for use with a computer screen resolution of 800 x 600 pixels. The "Web-safe" colour palette of 216 colours has been used.

This Web site is most accessible using browsers that support the latest World Wide Web Consortium recommendations. In general, browser versions 5 and above support all features as designed. Most version 4 browsers work well with this site although some features may be degraded. Browser versions 3 and below do not support the visual styles or accessibility features used in many pages. Nevertheless, the content of all pages is accessible to all users regardless of the browser version used.

Disclaimers

These documents are the final versions of Department of Finance publications. The Department assumes no responsibility for any discrepancies that may have been transmitted with the electronic version. The printed versions of the documents stand as the official record.

SPECIAL NOTE - Tax Treaties

The Department of Finance Canada assumes no responsibility for the accuracy or reliability of any income tax treaty available on this site. The treaties on this site have been prepared for convenience of reference only and have no official sanction. For all purposes of interpreting and applying the law, users should consult the acts implementing the treaties as passed by Parliament, which are published in the annual Statutes of Canada. The Canada Treaty Series, published by the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, could also be consulted. Consult the Where to Find Canada's Tax Treaties page for details on locating the official versions. These publications are available in most public libraries.

Finding What You Need

Check What's New

Keep current by checking What's New.

What's New lists everything added to the Finance Canada WWW site in the previous 30 days, in reverse chronological order. It changes constantly as new documents are added.

Click on any navy blue linked text to see the full text of the corresponding document.

Use the Site Map

The Site Map is accessible from all core pages. It provides a listing of the site which can be used to link directly to any part.

When to Browse & When to Search

Browsing: The contents of the Finance Canada WWW site have been organized along subject lines. If you know where the information you need is likely to be, follow the links through the pages to access what you need.

Searching: Use Search, accessible on the navigation bar of every core page, to search the contents of all  Finance Canada WWW site documents.

The search engine can search for the following kinds of information:

• a single word or a list of words;
• a phrase (words in a specific order);

A number of advanced searching techniques can be used including: truncation, use of Boolean operators, and fuzzy searching. Searches can be saved by bookmarking them (Netscape) / adding to Favorites (Internet Explorer) to be reused.

Tips for searching have been provided to help you with this.

Using the Advanced Search, you can:

• produce more useful targeted results by searching specific years and/or particular types of content, such as news releases, publications, etc.
• follow up immediately with a federal- government-wide search if you didn't find what you wanted on the Finance Canada site.
• find videos, slide shows or multimedia presentations, reflecting the growing importance of voice and image-based Web presentations.

Document Formats

Most of the documents on the Finance Canada WWW site are available in HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) format, the lingua franca of the Internet.

Some documents are also posted in Adobe Acrobat format (*.pdf).

• Using the Adobe Acrobat Reader.

News Releases and selected publications are also available in MS Word on the FTP site.

Budget publications are available in MS Word format as self-extracting folder for downloading.

Draft legislation is available on the FTP site in WordPerfect 5.1 format.

• Using the Finance Canada FTP site to download word-processed documents.

To enjoy the Finance Canada multi-media features, you will need to download and install the appropriate players. Click on the links below to obtain the required plug-ins:

	Shockwave - animation player. 1999 and 2001 Budget.
	Flash - animation player. 1999 Fall Update, 2000 and 2001 Budget, Tax Calculators
	RealPlayer - audio/video player. Budget 2000 and 2001 and Economic Statement and Budget Update.
	Windows Media Player - audio/video player. Budget 200 and 2001