organization – labeling – navigation – search
DESCRIPTION
Information Architecture Designing and Organising Digital Information Spaces Part II. IA Building Blocks. Organization – Labeling – Navigation – Search. Organization Structures. Hierarchy : taxonomies, top levels, mental model Database : structured content, metadata, facets, relationships - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
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Information Architecture Information Architecture Designing and Organising Digital Information SpacesDesigning and Organising Digital Information Spaces
Part II. IA Building BlocksPart II. IA Building Blocks
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Organization Structures
Hierarchy: taxonomies, top levels, mental model
Database: structured content, metadata, facets, relationships
Hypertext: cross-references, contextual
hierarchy
database
hypertext
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Organization Schemes
ExactEverything has a place.Easy to create and maintain.Great for known-item searches.e.g., white pages, geography, chronology
AmbiguousFuzzy and full of overlap.Hard to create and maintain.Great for subject searches, associative learning.e.g., yellow pages, topic, audience
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“Consider for example the proceedings we call games. I mean board games, card games, ball games, Olympic games, and so on. What is common to them all?”
Ludwig Wittgenstein, 1945
Philosophical Investigations
Games
Soccer
ChessSolitaire
Quake
Movies
InvestingHoroscopes
Personals
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[email protected] Resemblances
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green squares
orange circles
blue triangles
olive blocks
solid boxes
glass marbles
small spheres
hollow shapes
big mountains
Most categorization is automatic and unconscious.
When we define categories, we choose which attributes or properties to surface.
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“Categorization is not a matter to be taken lightly. There is nothing more basic than categorization to our thought, perception, action, and speech.”George Lakoff
Professor, Cognitive Linguistics
UC Berkeley
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Prototype Theory
• Prototype-based categories defined by fuzzy cognitive models rather than objective rules.
Family Resemblances
• Members may be related without all members sharing any common property.
Centrality
• Some members may be better examples
Membership Gradience
• Some categories have degrees of membership and no clear boundaries
Basic Level Primacy
• A psychologically basic (folk-generic) level in the hierarchy. Optimal for learning, recognition, memory, knowledge organization.
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Kingdom Animalia
Phylum Chordata
Class Mammalia
Order Cetacea
Family Delphinidae
Genus Tursiops
Species Truncatus
Suborder Odontoceti
Subphylum Vertebrata
Animal
Mammal
Whales, Dolphins
Dolphins, Killer Whales
Bottlenose Dolphin
Toothed Whales
Vertebrate
Grey Dolphin
Black Dolphin
Bottlenose Porpoise
Cowfish
Bottle-Nosed Dolphin
Atlantic Bottlenose
Pacific Bottlenose
Basic Level
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Kingdom Electronics
Phylum Handhelds & PDAs
Family Sony
Genus Clie
Species PEG-NZ90
Class Palm Operating Systems
Sony Clie PEG-NZ90 Handheld
Electronics > Audio & VideoElectronics > Brands > Sony Electronics > Camera & PhotoElectronics > ComputersGifts > Over $100
Basic Level
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Descriptive Name
A name which describes a product, service, or company. Descriptive names, such as Workgroup Server and Pacific Gas and Electric, have content, but often are not protectable and typically are not favored by trademark attorneys.
Proprietary NameA protectable name which one is able to own and trademark, as opposed to a descriptive name, which is not protectable or ownable. See Brand Name.
Suggestive NameA name built on or utilizing words or word parts which suggest or refer to the goods or services, but do not literally describe them. Oracle and Safeway are suggestive. Suggestive names are often protectable (unlike descriptive names), but may be weaker as trademarks than coined/fanciful or arbitrary names.
PsycholinguisticsThe study of how language is understood and interpreted and how and why the individual responds to discrete aspects of language.
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NavigationSupport task flow
Provide context and flexibility
Avoid drowning content
Where Am I?
Wha
t's N
earb
y?
What's RelatedTo What's Here?
Global Navigation
Loca
l Nav
igat
ion
Content Lives Here,With ContextualNavigation Inline
Or Separate.
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[email protected] Question Mark Up on the Paper
What is this page about? Draw a rectangle around the title of the page or write it on the paper yourself
What site is this? Circle the site name, or write it on the paper yourself
What are the major sections of this site?
Label with X
What major section is this page in?
Draw a triangle around the X
What is "up" 1 level from here? Label with U
How do I get to the home page of this site?
Label with H
How do I get to the top of this section of the site?
Label with T
What does each group of links represent?
Circle the major groups of links and label. D: More details, sub-pages of this one N: Nearby pages, within same section as this page S: Pages on same site, but not as near O: Off-site pages
How might you get to this page from the site home page?
Write the set of selections as: Choice 1 > Choice 2 > .... Connect the visual elements on the page that tell you this.
Navigation Stress Test by Keith Instone > http://keith.instone.org/navstress/
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Nike.com > North America > USA > NikeRunning.com > Gear > Footwear > Women’s > Trail > Air Trail Pegasus
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Supplemental NavigationSitemaps
Table of contents
Top few levels of hierarchy
Scope / organization
Exploratory browsing
IndexesA-Z index (back-of-book)
Finely grained
Relatively non-hierarchical
Known-item finding
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Search
“…studies show that search is still the primary usability problem in web site design.”
Vividence Research: Common Usability Problems
1. Poorly organized search results
2. Poor information architecture
Source: Flexible Search and Navigation using Faceted Metadata (UC Berkeley SIMS)
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“Most of the complaints we get are due to the way users search; they use the wrong keywords.”Manufacturing Manager in Must Search Stink? by Forrester Research
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“I really do see the future in terms of categories and clicking. The more I watch what's happening with the evolution of web sites, the more I believe that Search is essentially an experiment that has failed.”
Jared Spool
http://www.info-arch.org/lists/sigia-l/0302/0297.html
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Where To Find MePeter Morville
Semantic Studios
http://semanticstudios.com/
Asilomar Institute for Information Architecture
http://aifia.org/
Findability
http://findability.org/