Information Architecture

About This Blog

2008-11-25T05:39:00.001-08:00

This blog was created as a part of my Master’s program class called Information Architecture taught by Dr. Scott Simon. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed doing the required assignments. I have learned so much during this course that it sparked an intention to develop my knowledge and skills even further. I would like to continue to update this blog even after the class is over. I hope that it turns into a great reference stop in the future.

Week 14

2008-11-24T05:42:00.001-08:00

Part III: Technological Information – Information as Reality

Chapter 11: Elementary Measures

The chapter was subdivided into three sections: the electron, the bit, and the content. I was surprise to see this division. The first two had a logical connection compared with the third one. From ancient times, humanity wanted to understand the quantitative composition of the elements and gave different explanations to the material structure. Physics is based on exact laws that explain natural phenomena, and mathematics is its perfect instrument for this explanation. Borgmann probably picked from all elemental particles the electron to serve as an elementary measure because the electron “was the first of the atomic particles; it, unlike the proton, for example, has remained elementary to this day.” Sometimes the explanation of things can be found on the lowest level and Borgmann was looking to find this elementary particle and put it together with his understanding of information. He goes further to show that the binary system of 1 and 0 are “sufficient to express anything that can be rendered in any notation.” Although everything can be recorded with the binary system, humans are unable to interpret the long string of numbers without the help of machines. He expects that “the increasing power and sophistication of the vehicles of information would bring in their train ever richer contents of information.” In the last part of this chapter, Borgmann writes that we cannot replace reality with “bits of information,” but we can comprehend the general outline of reality and its connection to information.

Chapter 12: Basic Structures

“The least and most basic structure of all seems to be division, a distinction when made by the mind, a difference when found in reality.” From that assumption he goes straight to Boolean algebra and the first computers. It is like building a staircase: each individual step contributes to the completion of the staircase. Basic structure explains in an indirect way complexity of the world. He questions the benefits and the quality of computer technological advances.

Chapter 13: Transparency and Control

“Technological information can reveal otherwise invisible things not only on and above the earth, but beneath the earth as well.” It is clear that we improved our vision on things through technology, but Borgmann poses a question if transparency is sufficient to organize the information about reality. Technology information reveals the structure and shape of things, but after their secret is learned another comes in to replace it. Borgmann is dissatisfied that we leave the computers to take control and towards “own course.” He thinks that technology casts shadows over the transparency creating a false sense of reality in our culture. “Here the path of information technology runs from the transparency of information to the control of information and from there to the control of reality.”

Chapter 14: Virtuality and Ambiguity

He points that information has be delivered by bits. Each year we produce better storage devices and are capable of recording large amounts of data with impeccable quality. Borgmann thinks that we prefer more the perfection of technological information over the reality. He points out that virtual reality deprives information from reality and people become detached from their senses and the actual world. But at the end “nobody and nothing of consequence can escape reality.”

Chapter 15: Fragility and Noise and Conclusion

Borgmann warns against the fragility of technological information. The new formats are worthless compared to the paper materials that have survived for centuries even millennia. Technology information also creates noise. It is also fragile. Education, business and other spheres of life have changed drastically in the last twenty years. He is concerned that we rely primarily on technology and are losing touch with natural and cultural reality. He is negative in regards to the new technological advances and tries to dismiss their benefits. He is trying to hold onto reality by any old means and to preserve the balance between reality and technology. At the end he simply becomes too myopic to see that the world has changed to offer new possibilities. Sooner or later people will find a balance between cyberspace and reality, if not already found.
I had to admit that the book was intriguing and surprisingly conveyed its message. I thought that the theological touch was not complete, and it was not appropriate in the development of its concept. It depicts only the religious views of the western world and slightly touched on other cultures and religions. But the main point, as I mentioned before, is his inadequate view of technological information and cyberspace.

Borgamnn and the Borg: Consumerism vs. Holding on to Reality by Charles Ess

I agree with Ess that Borgmann uses theological elements to prove his concept and tries to bring up the apocalyptic points in his conclusion. He admires Borgmann’s work, and so do I for his fundamental attempt to “develop theory and ethics of information.” Ess agrees with Borgmann most of the time and feels that people are alienated from reality. The difference is in the degree to which he agrees. Ess thinks that users will eventually become Borg, cyber humans from the movie Star Trek, where everything will be assimilated without resistance, but he thinks that Borgmann’s final conclusion is off balance.

Week 13

2008-11-17T13:44:00.001-08:00

Part II: Cultural Information: Information for Reality

Chapter 6: Producing Information – Writing and Structure

“Natural information emerges of itself, intimates rather than conveys its message, and disappears. Cultural information, to the contrary, is wrested and abstracted from reality, carries a definite content, and assumes an enduring shape” (p.59).
Structure is everywhere, and it is no wonder that the alphabet and written language comply with the same laws. The numbers of letters are definite with similar marks that makes them easy to remember. Language follows rules called grammar. The early attempts by Plato to analyze language by its sounds were one of the first tries to explain nature by its elemental components. “The dream of lawful structure, extends from language to reality will be seen to coincide, the coincidence providing the tightest possible bond between signs and things.” It is hard to explain how a single thing matches a particular word without analyzing its structure. Borgmann tries to dissect alphabetical writing through the eyes of geometry and structural building since the beginning of time. With the Pythagorean Theorem, Euclid’s five postulates, Descartes’ coordinate system, and Newton’s mechanics, we see that reality is highly structured. For Borgmann two points can be connected by a straight line and simple physics and math explain the world around us. Reality is structured and organized, and “geometry reveals the structure of the world’s form, physics discloses the structure of its content, of things that fill the world”.

Chapter 7: producing Information – Measures and Grids

Borgamnn says that “when language informs us about reality, it does not picture what is remote in time, space, or conception, but reminds us of the eloquence of things or prompts us to imagine their voice.” Natural signs change and people start using grids to convey information. Today everything is so easy to find with the aid of GPS, that we forget what came before. The same goes for time. Just imagine a day based on the sun movement through the sky. I would not be able to definitely tell when my homework is due. We often forget that grids exist even in print material. Text is read (at least in the Western Languages) from left to right from the top of a page to bottom. Finding structure in all things is a way to obtain information about reality.

Chapter 8: Realizing Information – Reading

Writing and drawing convert information into a material that writers, composers, or builders can use to articulate their conceptions at leisure and at length. Borgamnn calls the reverse process “realizing information.” It is “converting the instructions of a design into something real. He goes back in history and describes the different methods of reading. No matter what the style is “reading is more than recognizing strings of letters as words and knowing their acoustic shape.”

Chapter 9: Realizing Information – Playing

Music has its own structure, and there is something magical when a musician performs it from a score. “The musical mind appears to command a set of formal rules – a musical grammar, so to speak – that allows it to abstract the sounds or a score of the cantata these and other structural features.” Each society creates its own music that reflects its contemporary issues, and musicians are its carriers.

Chapter 10: Realizing Information – Building

“Building, more so than reading or playing, runs into the perils and favors of contingency.” Borgmann’s example of the Freiburg Minster shows that building design emerges and references its time. It conveys “symbolic ambiguity” like other forms of arts. It is not always easy to decipher reality through this kind of information, but it is easy to admire the beauty of it.

Holding on to Reality

2008-11-14T10:30:00.001-08:00

Linear B

Holding on to Reality

Introduction and Part I: Natural Information about Reality

Albert Borgmann offers an interesting approach to deciphering the nature of information. I was surprised to learn that the noun “information” was born with our contemporary meaning and understanding in 1948 in an article called “Information” by Claude Shannon. I read somewhere that our concept of understanding the world is derived from our past and acquired knowledge. Expanding the later will consequently expand our ability to be better prepared. Borgmann calls them knowledge by acquaintance vs. knowledge by description. An ancient Indian tale says that the person who acquires knowledge through experience is wise, but the person who acquires knowledge by learning from other people’s past experiences is wiser. Borgmann looks from signs. “A letter is principally a sign.” But can we decipher natural signs and the link that they provide to information or is it a Herculean effort to break the gravity of reality? Written language changed the way we interpret information. People no longer relied solely on memory. Oral language is like threads waiting to be weaved into the shawl called written language. One is the physical, visible aspect of the other.

Media Reform, A Critical Issue of Our Times

2008-11-12T12:43:00.000-08:00

From: COAnews

If you can't communicate, you can't fight back. In the wake of unprecedented media consolidation, grassroots resistance to corporate control of our public airwaves and the internet has been growing. Robert W. McChesney, President of Free Press, outlines the importance of media in connection to all other progressive struggles.

Fred von Lohmann - Media Industry Resistance to Change

2008-11-12T12:39:00.000-08:00

Week 12

2008-11-10T13:01:00.001-08:00

Chapter 8: The Web of Informational News

Today we are soaked in an enormous deluge of information. Most people refer to this problem as an information overload. Chapter 8 pointed out that with increased information, the time to absorb it has stayed the same. News web sites are updated 24/7 and instantaneously, making some of the traditional Media channels look like dinosaurs. The Web almost always complements the paper editions and news television programs. As a result of the constant demand to produce news, the quality and depth of the coverage has diminished. On the other hand, the Web changes the user’s behavior from passive to active. It was pointed out that the average user becomes a researcher rather than a mere reader, viewer, or listener. The Web is also used by the government as a repository for its documents. Since 1999 almost all of federal and state documents are published on the web. It is another question if they are easily obtainable. Newsgroups and Weblogs are other forms of daily news sources written by journalists as well as laymen. The news has become globalized by the Web. It is easy to open a French newspaper’s web site and read the details of a local farmers’ strike or Paris’s most promising candidate for mayor. The Web has definitely transformed the way we see the world.

Chapter 9: Web of Entertainment

This chapter starts with the observation that the Web changed “the physical boundaries like the movie, video cassette, CD, the book. Now, because of advances in information technology, this physical boundary has been broken.” The digital MP3 format made it possible to share files via the internet. Users felt that they could share their music with others the same way they used to share tangible music formats (CDs, cassettes, records). For the majority of them that was not copyright infringement. This process was facilitated by companies like Napster, where user to user file sharing was not restricted and regulated. The Big Five music companies (EMI, Time Warner, Sony, Universal Vivendi and BMG) missed seeing an opportunity in this technological market, where users wanted to be in control of their choices. Users can now download only the songs of their particular interest without paying the whole price for a CD. Of course, the “napsterization” of the internet posed a serious question about how users see the uploading and downloading of copyrighted music and also created a whole new attitude towards the entertainment industry. Although the control over copyrighted music has tightened, web users still think that music over the internet should be free, or at least free for sampling. The three major mistakes by the music industry were:
1. The fast development of the Internet and technology and its effects,
2. The failure to see the change and catch the new opportunity MP3 file sharing was offering, and,
3. The inability to take a chance and perceive the file sharing music fans as “adaptors and innovators.”
There will always be always people with on the opposite sides of this issue. The solution is not in narrow mindedness and greed but in open constructive work from both sides – fans and music industry.

Conclusion:

“Unifying the Web into a simple medium is fraught with inconsistencies and exceptions to a degree that is unparalleled in past media.”
The authors tried to unravel the Web through two concepts, Loose Web and Cultural Production Thesis, by observing everyday activities of users.

Copyright, Digital Media, and Education

2008-11-09T19:12:00.001-08:00

From: psutlt
Added: September 23, 2008

At the Learning Design Summer Camp, Dr. Matt Jackson discussed issues surrounding the use of digital media for academic purposes.

Week 11

2008-11-03T06:03:00.001-08:00

Chapter 5: The Look of the Web

The chapter starts with a brief historical overview of the look of the Web. I remember my first experience, when there were not any Graphic User Interfaces (GUI) and everything had to be coded. The mouse was not available yet, and computers cost a fortune. The Internet as we know it today was just a science fiction. During the last presidential election, CNN showed a holographic image of one of their reporters, created by 44 cameras and about 30 computers. Star Wars Princess Leah was alive in their studio and proved that everything is possible. The Web is probably the fastest growing media, and therefore, its look will constantly change depending on the new technologies. Today the web is a mixture of images and text and in many ways resembles a magazine. Flashing banners and other media are integrated into pages. Movies and news are streamed simultaneously on the Web. Large chunks of data can be transmitted effortlessly from one point of the world to another. TV shows like “24” and “Dawson’s Creek” created a new trend by providing additional details from their shows on their web sites and thus, kept the viewers’ interest between the shows. This was a great marketing idea. Hyperlinks and hypertexts have created a non-linear approach to information that make the Web seemed like one big document. The Web has become a hybrid media with its own aesthetics criteria and rewards (www. Webbyawards.com/main/).

Chapter 6: Web Economy

The Web offers not only an exchange of goods and services, but also an exchange of ideas and opinions. The authors called this scene of promulgations “agora”. By its nature the Web differs from the other types of media where the information is conveyed from one to many. The Greek agora is an open space where one can hear and be heard. “The Web is producing similar virtual agora. It is cacophony of presentation and representation that deliberately violates divisions that we have set up through our modern institutions to operate distinctively” (Burnett, 2003).
Many think that the Web is a large library where a person can cross-reference easily by the means of hyperlinks and thus jump from one source to another. Al Gore’s metaphor “information highway” largely accepted by laymen and scientists, showed the large support of the U.S. government not only to the commercial Web, but also to the educational in the transport of information. Today the Internet economy is one of the largest employers, “larger than the American communications industry or insurance industry and twice as large as the airline industry or property industry.” Simply put, the Web changed how we do business, study, and communicate.

Chapter 7: The Web of Policy, Regulation and Copyright

This is definitely my favorite chapter so far.
The ideas of Peter Drucker are not new to me. In the 1990s it was largely accepted that we were entering a new post industrial society, information society, in which the workforce qualifications will change drastically. Unlike any other media, the Internet offered an easy reproduction of works. In the attempt to protect the legal right of owners, the government created regulations and copyright laws, many of which are confusing and, in my opinion, suffocate progress and innovation. The copyright law was established as a way to compensate creators for their work, so that they can create more works. “Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (Title 17, U.S. Code) to the authors of ‘original works of authorship,’ including literary, dramatic, music, artistic, and certain other intellectual works. This protection is available to both published and unpublished works” (U.S. Copyright Office, 2006). The first copyright law protected a work for fourteen years and then can be renewed for another fourteen years. In contrast, today a work is protected during the life of the author plus 70 years. The imbalance in the copyright law is even stronger in the digital world. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) from 1998 created even tougher restrictions for the Web.
Section 1201[of DMCA] divides technological measures into two categories:
measures that prevent unauthorized access to a copyright work and measures that prevent unauthorized copying of a copyrighted work. Making or selling devices or services that are used to circumvent either category of technological measure is prohibited in certain circumstances. (U.S. Copyright Office, 1998)

Once I buy a book I can read and reread, write notes in the margins, lend it to someone, or sell it without paying any additional royalties. In the digital word I can’t reread the same article without paying for it. Every time I open the article I make a copy on my RAM, and thus, I am obligated to pay royalties to the creator. The Web is a relatively new environment and some of the regulations will experience multiple reformations until a desired balance is achieved.

Week 10

2008-10-27T04:46:00.001-07:00

Norbert Wiener

Image courtesy of the Research Laboratory of Electronics at en:MIT.

Chapter 2: Information and Networks

The author starts the chapter with a short intro to the history of computer technology. I thought that the analogy between DNA and binary codes that represent commands is very good. I remember when I first learn that letters and symbols are replaced by zeros and ones in one of my high school classes. A simple word like number is coded like this:
01101110 01110101 01101101 01100010 01100101 01110010. It also decodes the term cybernetics (Κυβερνήτης – steersman or governor) founded by Norbert Wiener. Louis Kaufmann defines cybernetics as a “the study of systems and processes that interact with themselves and produce themselves from themselves.” I never thought that toasters and microwaves are two of the simplest existing cybernetic machines and part of so-called smart technology. We are so used to the surrounding technology that we rarely ask ourselves questions of any philosophical value. It is interesting how cybernetic technology entered the Web. The first thing that it comes to my mind is the famous “cookies” and other applications created to provide feedback loops about the habits of the user. Most of them, including the cited example Bonzi, are created with one goal to collect users’ information about their habits and later to sell a particular product.
The second part of this chapter talks about the Web network. Van Dijk defined “network” as “a connection between at least three points or units” and Castells set the term “network society” to describe the cultural change cause by the Internet. We can agree that the Web has reshaped the world we see today since those terms were established. Location is no longer a hindrance and information blurs the geographical borders. Under the influence of the Web, the world has become closer despite its diversity.

Chapter 3: The Web as Communication

We rarely think about the different types of communications: interpersonal (face-to-face ‘FtF’), mass media (one-to-many), machine-assisted (many-to-many) and many-to-one. Communications can be a dialogue, monologue or multilogue (Listservs). Ellis names four categories of communication depending on their temporal appearance: face-to-face, asynchronous, synchronous distributed, and asynchronous distributed. Communication occurs in all of these forms on the Web. At the beginning of the Internet when the connection was slow and fewer computers existed, emoticons and acronyms emerged. At the time it was easy to learn from their usage who was a newbie or geek. Now they are part of everyday e-mails or chat messages.

Chapter 4: Webs of Identity

It is interesting to examine what happens after one enters the Web and what the social impacts are. It is hard to say if the Internet’s negative effects outweigh the positive. For every person who thinks that the Internet creates isolation there is a person who would say that the Web not only bonds families and friends around the world but also strengthens these relationships. It is undisputable that the Web is addictive, because of its versatile and interactive medium. Because of this convenient medium many choose to create personal web sites or blogs. The comparison between them and the front yard of a house describes best this social form of communication and the desire to express oneself. This poses other questions: Can one really stay anonymous on the Web and how much private information to disclose?

Web Theory: An Introduction by Robert Burnett and P. David Marshal

2008-10-23T05:05:00.000-07:00

Chapter 1: Web of Technology

This chapter brings up an interesting question about “technological determinism.” The term is “used to describe this power of technology over a culture and is very useful in understanding the current power of the Web and where that power originates.” It often changes the human perspective on how we see technological advances. I agree that we sometimes view the technology in culture through utopian and dystopian glasses. Ideas like that create vision of a human with a super chip memory or super intelligent machines destroying the world. How much impact those ideas have on the development of new technologies is a big question. Can technological determinism (TD) predict the future and set a course for the present? It was said that TD is oversimplified, but tries to understand the influence of the Web. Today we can agree that the Web has become a “global village” that affects not only one nation. This type of medium can be determined as a “space-bias,” dissimilating information instantaneously around the world. It can hardly be characterized as “time-bias” no matter how vast archival materials the Web offers. This chapter offers food for thought from a completely different and provocative perspective for the Web.

Week 9

2008-10-20T07:29:00.001-07:00

Chapter 20: MSWeb: An Enterprise Intranet

This is one of the great examples that the book offers to show how a large organization’s informational architecture was improved. As the authors stated at the end of the chapter there was nothing revolutionary in reorganizing or developing new tools. But I think that its success in such a large corporation is. It is not easy for any team to maneuver through the political environment of even small companies, to put aside the departmental interests and to stay rational and complete the project. What I really liked is that they put aside the complicated terms and looked for simple and popular substitutes for their taxonomies and the most used queries. The users were their priority and that is why they succeeded in their efforts.

Chapter 21: evolt.org: Online Community

Evolt is just another social networking site, or is it? I read this chapter with great interest. The simple organization has different levels of participation, and anyone, members, and administrators, can contribute to its success. Hooked up from this chapter I went straight to the source, evolt.org. I was a bit disappointed, by expecting a lot more articles. Somehow I thought that those articles will be just like in an academic magazine, but they were just casual talk between colleagues. On a second glance, I found that this site offers something that that type of magazine cannot. This constructive exchange of ideas is a forum where everybody can learn and participate. Even I got some ideas for my own project.

Web Sites

2008-10-16T05:32:00.001-07:00

Picture created with Taggalaxy

Google Pack
http://pack.google.com/intl/en/pack_installer.html?hl=en&gl=us&utm_campaign=en&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-google&utm_medium=ha&utm_term=free%20software

Google Pack or Get the Most of Your PC offers Google Earth, Norton Security Scan, Google Desktop, Mozilla Firefox with Google Toolbar, Adobe Reader, Skype, StarOffice, Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer, Spyware Doctor Starter Edition, Picasa, Google Photos Screensaver, Google Talk, and RealPlayer. Google Pack automatically checks for the available software. I downloaded Picasa and Google Desktop. With Google Desktop I downloaded a News Blob. This can be a little bit annoying when the news screen pops up in the middle of important project.
Free Software Foundation http://www.fsf.org/
This is 501 (c) 3 nonprofit organization established to “promote computer user freedom and to defend the rights of all free software users.” One of the founders of this organization is the famous GNU project developer, Richard M. Stallman. His is the copyleft (work can be modified and distributed) concept which became GNU General Public License. The copyleft sign is a reverse “c” and can be found on this web site.
Without the GNU project we would not have today the free operating system, Linux. The opinion is that today the copyright law protects the big corporations heavily and publishing companies and suppresses the creation and development of new ideas and works.

Freeware Files
http://www.freewarefiles.com/

This is an excellent directory of available free software. I downloaded Paint. Net v3.36 from the Graphic/Design section and can say that I really liked it. The submission policy is pretty louse. Anybody can submit software as long as it is not Software bundled with Adware/Spyware, Shareware, Demos, Trialware, Crippled Software, Non-English Software, and Reseller or Affiliate software. What was annoying on this web site is the Google Ads that are everywhere and look like a part of software. All the works are rated by the users from zero to five. The new submitted files appeared on the right hand side. After selecting a category, a submenu is displayed. Featured Download and Popular choices are shown right under it.

Free-Soft.org
http://www.free-soft.org/

“Open Source is a marketing name for Free Software, coined in Feb 1998 as an attempt to overcome the confusion over the word "free" in the English language.” This web site is not well organized. It looks like a leftover from the 90’s. I found a lot of broken links. Most of the articles have not been updated since 2002. The examples of Open Source software lead to external links. On the positive side, there is a list of major Free Software organizations.

Week 8

2008-10-14T05:19:00.001-07:00

Chapter 17: Making the Case for Information Architecture

The chapter starts with the words “You Must Sell.” The terminology and notions that IA uses are not always clear. They are very abstract and intangible which makes them hard to digest. In order to sell their work, information architects must know what they will face in the business world and how those people think. Preparing for the two different types, described in the book, “by the numbers” and “gut reactionaries” is the way to go. Using the same language to close the gap between the business world and IA is the first step. From my experience, I think that most business people are interested to hear ROI (Return on Investment) numbers and how IA will contribute to the company’s productivity, increased revenue, customers’ satisfaction, and so forth. Is the 255% return on investment the correct number, or is it only 25%? Can an IA investment go up in the thousands percent? Can we calculate a ROI for every project? Those questions are hard to answer and the authors suggested disclosing that ROI numbers are used to predict future benefits and that IA is not quantifiable in nature.
The other type of business people, “gut reactionaries,” is convinced through storytelling from personal experience of others. The can feel the other people’s pain through one of these techniques: User Sensitivity, Expert Site Evaluations, Strategy Sessions, Competitive Analyses, Comparative analyses, Ride the Application Salesman’s Wake, and Be Aggressive and Be Early.

Chapter 18: Business Strategy

We can’t study IA without understanding the relationship of the two seemingly different fields - Business Strategy and IA. Peter Morville called it a strange connection (http://argus-acia.com/strange_connections/strange006.html). The relationship was well shown in Figure 18-1 from page 379. Business Strategy was the one that informs and pushes IA, and on the other hand IA provokes innovation and reveals gaps.
“The Blind Men and the Elephant” by John Godfrey Saxe is an interesting lesson for this multidimensional field. Can we see it all or only parts? I found that Kickball Charlie’s (http://bayshorekb.blogspot.com/2008/09/some-anekantavada-for-ya.html) post about Anekāntavāda and the lesson of the blind men brought back something I have forgotten, we cannot always see the whole picture, but we can always learn from our competitors that there is another side of the coin.

"Anekāntavāda (Devanagari: अनेकान्तवाद) is one of the most important and basic doctrines of Jainism. It refers to the principles of pluralism and multiplicity of viewpoints, the notion that truth and reality are perceived differently from diverse points of view, and that no single point of view is the complete truth."
(Kickball Charlie, 2008)

Web Sites

2008-10-08T08:54:00.001-07:00

http://www.gdoss.com/web_info/information_architecture_deliverables.php

The documents on Web IA Deliverables and Diagrams give not only the basic definitions, but also incredible IA examples from a variety of sectors. I was not familiar with one of the suggested examples – User Profile (aka Personas). This profile tries to humanize a potential user by giving him name, occupation, age, gender, education, computer and web experience, behavior patterns, manner of site usage, specific demographic, and even a stock photo. Sometimes project developers can be carried away and forget the user’s needs. This Persona profile is like a grounding stone that forces them to evaluate and study the targeted group of users. Suddenly, the persona, Steve, is not only an abstract, but the soul of the project.

TextMap
http://www.textmap.com/

I think this is incredible web site from an IA standpoint. I input Bulgaria to see how it is represented by TextMap. Three distinct columns are showed on the top of the page. The first one contains the latest articles referencing this Eastern European country, followed by diagram (blueprint) of Relational Networks that represents different relationships and links between the entries. The second column is a series of three diagrams: Reference Time Series, and News Sector Distribution Sentiment Analysis.

Reference Time Series charts the fluctuations in five categories: News, Business, Entertainment, Sports, and Other. A Total is also shown on the diagram. It was hard to read any of the diagrams. The font was really small and sometimes most of the results were overlapping. Heatmap was not shown.
It is interesting to see how popular a term can be and also when it becomes popular. It almost can answer the question what is hot and not.
For that reason I went I inputted the names of “McCain” and “Obama.” This is his Popularity Time Series. High spike occurred between 8/24 and 8/29. The time before McCain picked Palin as his running mate. The animation feature is very interesting. The map is “Hot” map runs in a loop displaying every month.

The International Map is also very interesting, especially to see how foreign observes the events in the U.S. The last diagrams cover the Interaction graphs and Battle Maps. The Battle Maps usually encompass at least three years. Surprisingly, Sarah Palin was not on the Relational Network. For Barack Obama the Popularity Time Series was picking up again after 9/28. The TextMap is trying to create some kind of IA connection between “people, places, and things appearing in news text.” The Relationship Network is a typical blueprint, but on a large scale. This project is trying to map the impossible. This is incredible work by Steven Skiena and his partners from SUNY Stony Brook, that is still in progress.

Google Sets
http://labs.google.com/sets

I definitely think that Google Sets can serve well as a thesaurus. I picked McCain and Obama again and I got Giuliani, Clinton, Romney, Edwards, politics, primaries, Hillary, bidden, Iraq, and Rudy for the small set of 15 items or fewer. As Harmony pointed out on the Blackboard, one of the top entries was always Wikipedia. For more random items, the connection found by Google Sets was not always clear. I tried Bulgaria, vacation, Sofia and got the following results: vacation, Bulgaria, Sofia, Europe, monde, world, Romania, calcio, libia, hiv, strasburgo, reisemål, sfida, and Varna. But as I pointed out the connection is not always straight-forward. It is almost like a mind game to find out how those words are connected and why.

Week 7

2008-10-07T13:24:00.001-07:00

Chapter 14: Ethics

Information architects can be extremely knowledgeable in their field, but inexperienced when it comes down to questions of ethics. Chapter 14 did not answer all the questions, but charted the way through six ethical dimensions: Intellectual Access, Labeling, Categories and Classification, Granularity, Physical Access, Persistence, and Shaping the Future. The example of the autosuggest search substituting the results when searched for abortion book to adoption books from Amazon rose ethical questions. Careful investigation and planning is needed from every information architect when organizing sensitive and ambiguous topics. As the authors pointed out “the devil is in the level of detail” (Morville, 2007, p.343).
After reading this chapter, I had a feeling that from my experience working in a library and studying Library and Information Science, most librarians are prepared for those questions, one way or the other.

Chapter 15: Building an Information Architecture Team

The Dream Team would include a Strategy Architect, Thesaurus Designer, Controlled Vocabulary Manager, Indexing Specialist, Interaction Designer, IA Software Analyst, IA Usability Engineer, Cartographer, and Search Analyst. Large companies and consulting firms might have all those specialized positions staffed and even include others like Enterprise Information Architect, Social Navigation Architect, Content Management Architect, and Web Service Architect. Small companies might hire those specialists for a specific job or project. Steward Brand classifies societal layers - Nature, Culture, Governance, Infrastructure, Commerce, and fashion and Design - with a continuous rate of change from slow to fast. The Slowest layer is Nature to Fastest is Fashion and Art. The authors apply a similar method to the IA layers: Faceted Classification, Embedded Navigation System, Enabling Technology, Controlled Vocabulary, Adaptive Finding Tools, and Content, services, Interface. As they pointed out it would be painful to change the slowest layers in contrast to the fastest. This brings the idea that it is thoughtful to spend more time designing the slowest layers carefully since they may alter all the content and design of a given project.

Chapter 16: Tools and Software

This chapter gives all the important resources on Automated Categorization, Thesaurus Management Tools, Search Engines, Portal or Enterprise Knowledge Platform, Content Management Systems, Analytics, Diagramming Software, Prototyping Tools, and User Research that are used on a daily basis by any information architect. Some of them sound familiar, others are worth exploring. The list is long, but that’s what makes it worthwhile and will definitely help me with my future projects.

Web Sites

2008-10-05T06:00:00.001-07:00

http://semanticstudios.com/publications/semantics/000030.php

Information Seeking Behavior

Metaphors We Surf the Web By by Paul Maglio and Teenie Matlock (1998).
http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/cache/papers/cs/1731/http:zSzzSzwww.almaden.ibm.comzSzcszSzpeoplezSzpmagliozSzpubszSzmeta4surf.pdf/maglio98metaphors.pdf

This was very interesting survey on how people perceive the World Wide Web. From my foreign languages learning experience I have to agree that there is a connection between metaphors and thought process. Larkoff and Johnson noted that in 1980.
"Metaphor is typically viewed as a characteristic of language alone, a matter of words rather than thought or action...that metaphor is pervasive in everyday life, not just in language, but in thought and action. Our ordinary conceptional system, in terms of which we both think and act, is fundamentally metaphorical in nature." (Larkoff & Johnson, 1980 p.3)
Of course this study was done in 1998, and a lot has change since then. Most of the terminology that we use today is defined. A lot more people have a computer at home and use the Internet to gather information. I would like to see a linguistic study done today and compare it with this one. I think that people still “go to” a web site, although they are not really moving from point A to point B. Understanding of the physical users’ concepts and conceptual blend theory of how users perceive the web is of vital importance to IA.

Structure and Organization

An Update on Breadth vs. Depth by Kath Straub and Susan Weinschenk (2003).
http://www.humanfactors.com/downloads/apr03.asp#susan

This article compares broader shallow and narrow deep sites. Conceptual models of the information hierarchies that provide clear names on a broader structure deliver better results. The first and last selection menus should be broader than any other allowing the user to find the necessary information fast. This will have an emphasis on the hierarchical structure of the web site. This saves the users time and effort. For any project the golden medium has to be found between the notions of deep and broad optimal structure.

Navigation

Breadcrumb Navigation: Further Investigation of Usage
http://psychology.wichita.edu/surl/usabilitynews/52/breadcrumb.htm

Breadcrumb Navigation, the term came from the popular Grimm’s fairy tale Hansel and Gretel, is an attempt to provide internet users a way to find their way back through a website without using the “Back” button. This type of navigation also shows the user where he is on a particular web site. It kind of resembles tabs that we put in a book with particular subjects for future, easy reference. “There are three different types of breadcrumbs represented in websites – path, attribute, and location” (Instone, 2003). The survey investigated the location type breadcrumb. It found that sites with breadcrumbs usage are less likely to have users who click on the “Back” button than sites without this model, and users had a better idea of the organization of the web site.

Search

Bringing Order to the Web: Optimizing Search by Showing Results in Context by S. T. Dumais, E. Cutrell and H. Chen (2001).
http://research.microsoft.com/~sdumais/chi2001.pdf

Contextual clues added to the links (especially ones with ambiguous meanings) are beneficial to any IA and save a lot of users clicks. The group evaluated lists with hover summary, lists with summary inline, lists with category names, categories with hover summary, and categories with summary inline. The participants were selected from the Seattle area with various background and experience. They used subjective and objective measures to analyze the results. Some of the criteria were accuracy/give up, search time frame, variation of results per query by individuals, choice selection (interaction style), prior experience, etc.

From Jesse James Garrett's Web Site:

All Those Opposed
Making the case for user experience in a budget-conscious climate
http://www.ddj.com/architect/184411634

Today’s bad commercial web sites can be a serious hindrance for their financial success. User-centered design is the best way to improve user experience. Any company will gain a lot by providing a good design and will elevate its status among competitors. It was pointed out that sometimes it is difficult to break through the opinion of the “other people—managers, engineers, even other designers”—who think that they understand their users the best. There is also a fear that understanding user behavior costs a lot of money, and in today’s tight budgets companies are reluctant to spend extra cash on research. Sometimes, companies see the Q & A section of their web sites as a band-aid to all of their user experience problems.

Adaptive Path: User-Centered URL Design
by Jesse James Garrett September 24, 2002
http://www.adaptivepath.com/ideas/essays/archives/000058.php

I found this interesting essay on URLs. Many of us find daily that URLs are too long and full of characters that do not make any sense. Working at a library, I remember how hard sometimes it is to read those over the phone to a patron who is not computer literate. Jesse Garrett points out that everything starts with folder organization. The web designer team needs to use easy-to-remember names instead of meaningless numbers: 200008-23-20016-65. Those URLs are called CMSjunk. Even today (the essay was published in 2002) companies have not learned from the past and still use long technical strings. I guess their developers forget that they are not the only ones who will see or use the links. Applying the proper content management—not only where to put what, but also for URLs—will help users find their way around. Jesse Garrett concludes, “But in our imperfect world, users have come to depend on URLs to communicate key information as they navigate through the Web” (Garrett, 2002).

A Visual Vocabulary for Describing Information Architecture and Interaction Design
http://www.jjg.net/ia/visvocab/

The Vocabulary is an attempt to standardize the available visual tools presented to different audiences. The organization of the document itself is very clean and easy to browse through. It has Table of Contents, Summary with quick links, and Downloadable shape libraries. The Vocabulary is translated into 7 languages. The Vocabulary delivers even elementary conceptual models. With its simplicity it is the ideal tool for any IA novice.

http://www.net.vg/media7/index.html

This is the most bizarre web site I have seen lately. It looks like a novice rushed to practice some learned HTML tags. There is no traditional top and side navigational bar. The page does not contain any contextual clue to help me decipher where I was on this web site. Usually, index is typed at the end of any URL means that the user will be directed to the main page. I am not sure if this is the case here. This page, main or not, has a lot of advertisement, including the misleading navigation bar on the right under the name of Edelsbacher Design Group. It is hard to believe that the motto on the top “The little studio trusted by big business” is true. I wonder how they get business. For sure it is not from this web site. I looked for “About Us” or “Contact Us” links but they simply do not exist. The page indicates somebody called Martin designed the logos for Tennyson Group and a statement all major credit cards are accepted.
I thought that I could type the first part of the URL address http://www.net.vg and see if that will lead me to the “gold.” Unfortunately, I found a completely different company called Virtual Globe Network. From there I could not find my way back to the Logo web site. The only common thing between those web sites is that they posted the same Recommended Sites links and have a lot of broken links.

Week 6

2008-10-04T14:52:00.001-07:00

Chapter 12 – Design and Documentation

The transition from Research and Strategy to Design and Documentation might be bumpy because all the abstract ideas have to be represented in a visual way. It reminds me of a student who has done all the research for his paper, thought thoroughly over topic, and sits down to complete the project.
This chapter provides the guidelines for putting down IA on paper. It is important not to try to dispaly all aspects of IA in one diagram for everybody. Not all members of an organization speak the same language and have the same needs. Multiple views can explain better this multidimensional discipline. Presenting the visual work in person or via phone is one of the most important tasks for any information architect. No matter how good the representation is, there will be always questions. This phase will ensure proper implementation and future success.
There is no universal vocabulary for IA, but most information architects use Jesse James Garett’s (www.jjg.net/ia/visvocab). The two most used software programs to create visual presentations are MS Visio and Macintosh’s OmniGraffle.
Blueprints are the visual aids to support the top-down or bottom-up design. They are most commonly known as “site-maps” and give an idea how the site is laid out and what the relationships are between the different pages and their components. High-level blueprints are designed to show the overall structure of a web site. This approach can create an “umbrella architecture” allowing the coexistence of different designs and IA for small or large web sites. It is important to point out that standardization in the representation of the sub-web sites is necessary. All aspects are drawn on this model: Java or JavaScript, news feeds, advertising space, browsing features, and others. It was mentioned that function and purpose set precedence rather than layout (that’s what IA is all about). Blueprints should be kept simple avoiding techno jargon for the purpose of understanding by all team members. Each component is assigned a unique ID number for clarification and further reference. The blueprints can be detailed, telling where everything (navigation bar, text, pictures) needs to go. In the chapter there are great examples of different blueprints that give a novice information architects an idea what is expected. For more information visit: http://iawiki.net/sitemaps.
Wireframes are those ugly black and white diagrams describing the individual components on every page or template. They are only visual IA aids and should not be taken literally. They can be sketched or published with Adobe Illustrator or HTML. Like blueprints, wireframes have to be uniform for the whole site. Notes explaining different page elements are preferable. All team members need to use the same graphic components. To learn more on wireframes visit: http://iawiki.net/wireframes.
At the end of the chapter is where the two approaches, top-down from research and strategy and bottom-up design and implementation meet in the middle in the form of content mapping.

Chapter 13 – Education

This chapter was written to answer many of the readers’ questions in regards to how to learn IA. It was pointed out that experience, apprenticeship, conference and seminars, literature, communities, news and opinions along with formal education are the main means to become an information architect. Library and Information Science (leading with 40.3%) and Human-Computer Interaction (12.3%) are the main programs that prepare future information architects. We can find which schools offer IA degrees or classes by using the IAI web site. Just go to the web site and click on Learning IA > Education > Schools Teaching IA for more detailed information. Unfortunately, my school is not on the list, but I sincerely think that they will reconsider given the growing students’ interest in this relatively new field.

IA Demystified

2008-09-28T14:40:00.001-07:00

Demystifying Information Architecture

From: PatrickKennedy, 3 months ago

Demystifying Information Architecture

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: patrick kennedy ria)

"Presentation from WebDU 2008 in Sydney, where I attempt to give developers and designers some insight into what IA is and how it works, so they can integrate it into their own practices or just work more effectively with IA/UX practitioners" Partick Kennedy

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How-To

2008-09-25T06:15:00.001-07:00

Information architecture - A 'how to'

From: donnam, 2 years ago

Information architecture - A 'how to'

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: ia information architecture)

How to do information architecture - user research, content analysis, IA design, page layout design, wireframes and site maps

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Web Sites

2008-09-23T04:32:00.001-07:00

http://boxesandarrows.com/

This is the web site that can answer your IA questions. It is a peer review journal for “graphic design, interaction design, information architecture and the design of business.” Anybody can submit comments and articles and of course those articles are peer rated as well. This is fantastic way to get noticed in this small community. The articles can be republished in another magazine or journal, but Boxes and Arrows has a one week exclusive. Under the tab “People” I found all the published authors. I was interested to see what those people do for a living. On the top left-hand side there is a column with the highest-rated stories. Under the tab “Ideas” people share their vision and experience. The posts are in chronological order, just like a blog. Under the Forum I even found a question that concerns me in regards to two programs SmartDraw and Visio. The explanation was not satisfactory, but it showed that people share their experience which in this case is more important. Overall the web site audience, content type, and topic are geared towards IA specialist and students.

http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/newsmap.cfm

This is an interesting news aggregator. My first impression was that the design, utilizing color boxes is, overwhelming. This site is a complete navigational disorder. Colors (red, orange, purple, green, yellow, teal and fuchsia) represent the different categories: world, nation, business, technology, sports, entertainment, and health for three time frames. Every ten minutes the newsmap refreshes, displaying new world events. The top navigation tabs separate the news by country. From curiosity, I browsed those and I found out that the news changes from country to country. On my second and third visit I got familiar with the navigation structure and felt more comfortable searching for freshly “baked” news. Now I can say that I open this site first for exploring top news.

http://amazon.com/

Amazon remembers my last search, and after I open its first page, items are instantly suggested to me. Navigation is very easy, and that’s why Amazon is one of the most popular online stores. On the top nav bar there is a search box. Items can be search throughout the whole web site or by a specific category. I searched for Successories. Unfortunately, I found mostly books. Amazon was narrowing my choices by suggesting different categories. Sponsored links were featured under the results. I like that Amazon has a “Search Feedback”. I was satisfied with Amazon controlled vocabulary. They used simple language and divided the categories into subcategories very efficiently.

http://www.yahoo.com/

Yahoo is the second most used search engine. It is desirable to search by using different engines because their search algorithms, and therefore, their results are different. Yahoo offered a Search Assistant, a convenient pop down menu with suggestions, which attempted to narrow the results. Unfortunately, the suggestions were not what I was looking for. I got the same results as Google. Sometimes I start reading the news, or even get distracted by the amount of information offered on their first page. Probably, that’s why, for search, I go to Google. Yahoo’s top nav bar is divided into two sections “Yahoo Home” and “My Yahoo”. The left vertical bar is famous for its categories. I remember the days when I had to look for a specific college program and back then Yahoo was my savior. Yahoo finance is the free “Wall Street Journal” on the web.

http://www.google.com/

Google revolutionized the World Wide Web to the point that it became a verb. Its simplicity and great algorithm allowed users to feel comfortable with its search. Most people use the basic search. This search does not offer an Assistant like Yahoo. The last searches are memorized, making them easy to retrieve later by typing the first two letters of a word. The Advanced Search Option is good for searching documents in a different format, limiting the language choices, and for Boolean search. Topic-specific search engines are offered by Google. Most students go to Google Scholar for articles. Google offers a lot more, but a person needs to sign in to receive any additional services.

http://www.ebay.com/

The search box is similar to Amazon, but offers a lot more subcategories. Of course, more does not mean always better. I searched again for Successories. I did not get any subcategories from the main search box like Amazon, The Subcategories were listed on the top left-hand side. Looking at them I can say that I prefer Amazon’s controlled vocabulary that pops up after typing a search. Here I had to click from subcategory to subcategory to find an item. No matter, I can say that I found what I was looking for instantaneously, and that is what counts.

Week 5

2008-09-22T15:25:00.001-07:00

Chapter 10: Research

Research is the first phase of IA. Submersing in the client’s corporate atmosphere by using existing goals, structures, materials, and getting to the bottom of the organization is imperative. The book called it information ecology. Each organization is like a living being, and each component contributes to the organization in its own specific way. The information architect is there to dissect and learn its natural cycle by asking the right questions. The research framework is again pinpointed to the three words in IA: context, content, and users. Page 234 figure 10-3 summarizes the steps of any research into 12 squares. Context is the first step of the research. After learning as much as he can, the information architect can begin to compile the organization’s background information. He definitely has to possess people skills and be somewhat a detective to navigate in an unfamiliar sea. After compiling some satisfactory information he can begin implementing the second step, introductory presentations, conveyed to small groups. It is emphasized in the chapter that it is best to group people in small teams for best results. The most important group is called the stakeholders’ group. This process reminds me of the movie “The Godfather.” Once “the godfather” group declares its political support most groups will follow. The last step of the context research is the technology assessment. Company IT support is imperative and making them part of the game from step one is a priority.
The next research method is content. Many organizations try to scratch everything from their old web site and try to build a fresh one. That is like cutting a tree because there were a couple of sick leaves. Heuristic evaluation comes in by evaluating the content and determining the problems. The next step is content analysis done by analyzing formats, document types, sources, subjects (for possible classification), and existing architecture. content mapping vizualizes all the relationships. The next step is benchmarking and “involves the systematic identification, evaluation, and comparison of information architecture features of web sites and intranets.” User analysis is the last research method, but not the least important. Usage statistics, search-log analysis and customer support further develop the research method. This is probably the most important part of the process. IA is created to serve the user and he is at the center of it all. The results of the user testing play a key role in any IA.

Chapter 11: Strategy

The next step in the IA project is to create a strategy that will eventually organize the client’s web site. Once all “the cards” are on the table it comes down to the strategy development process: think, articulate, communicate, and test, or for short, TACT. The strategy report example from Weather.com really helps to digest the whole process. Looking at their web page I was wondering how exactly I would convey the results without any subjectivity that would affect the wireframe for weather.com. Maybe after all, the greatest challenge to any IA is not to be biased, but simply to look at the results and report them the way they are.

Websites

2008-09-21T04:41:00.001-07:00

http://www2.sims.berkeley.edu/research/projects/how-much-info-2003/

The US produces more information than any other country and in most cases is responsible for around 40% of the total world production. The numbers are so big that it is difficult to visualize how much exactly is created. The word “a lot” can’t even encompass the meaning of exabytes (1 exabyte is equal to 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 bytes). No wonder people feel overwhelmed about the amount of information that they receive on a day-to-day basis. This poses a challenge for every information architect, not only to organize the vast amount of information, but also to deal with the different formats and new information created every day. Media formats have changed at a faster pace than in the past. Information architects need to keep up with the new technology trends.

http://www.pewinternet.org

I have done the Topology Test before, and this time I am an Omnivore. Of course, now I own an IPod, an MP3 player, and I use an electronic planner to help me keep up with my growing tasks and appointments.

Pew Internet publishes interesting research articles. One of them, Reports: Technology and Media Use – Home Broadband Adoption 2008 (http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Broadband_2008.pdf), caught my eye. It reports that the sales of broadband internet for low-income families are flat. I do not think that this should be a surprise with the unstable economic situation. The broadband increase noticed in this survey is among people over 50, living in rural areas and lower-middle class for the period 2007-2008. Another interesting number is that some 27% of Americans still do not have internet connections and are not interested in getting them. Usually those are people above 61. How does this help the information architect? At least he can predict what connections his or her clients are using. Keeping this information in mind might be important for an information architect in choosing how to create and implement a site.

http://www.caida.org/home/

The Internet Topology Map is unbelievable. I opened the animated map to see where movement occurs based on the IP snapshots. The data in the animation is updated every other day. For those who like math the map is created with polar coordinates (radius and angle). The formula is given on the first page.

Week 4 Post II

2008-09-19T04:18:00.001-07:00

Chapter 8: Search Systems

In this age where everybody is bombarded by information, search engines have become the ultimate kings. Nobody thought that one engine would dominate the web and push all the others to virtual extinction. The question is not if a site needs a search engine, but if it needs Google. That is today’s user expectation for any large web site, especially the ones with dynamic content.
The fine tuning of a search engine can be compared to an art. Choosing the right index for a search and determining the right parts to be indexed can be a challenge, but they make all the difference between a doodle and a masterpiece. The search is made to retrieve useful information. As mentioned in one of the previous chapters slicing the content can be done by content type, audience, role, subject, geography, chronology, author, and department. Some components, like ads and disclaimers, should not be made available for search. What is important to any user is to find the information with fewer clicks. That’s where the search algorithms come in. Pattern-Matching algorithm is one of the most used. An algorithm of this kind is looking for a set of matching text in the documents. The chapter defines the terms “recall” and “precision”. Finely adjusting one or the other to find the best balance will bring the best search to users. Along with different types of algorithms, query builders are like the mortar that puts the bricks together to form a structure. Query builders such as spell-checkers, phonetic tools (soundex), stemming tools, natural language processing tools, controlled vocabulary and thesauri help the algorithms perform better in a world that is far from perfect.
The next important step is to display the results in a comprehensive and elegant way. I think that the search should be made easy to scan. It was suggested to display 10 results in a page and to use query terms in bold with the relevant text highlighted. Sorting and ranking is another way to improve the search results.
At the end it is not easy to “cook” the right mix of components behind the simple search box, but the information architect can strive for perfection.

Chapter 9: Thesauri, Controlled Vocabulary, and Metadata

This chapter is very close to the heart of any librarian. It talked about controlled vocabulary and semantics relationships. Controlled vocabulary types are synonym rings (similar words by meaning, but not always synonyms), authority files (preferred terms including all synonyms, misspellings and abbreviations), classification schemes (terms organized in a hierarchy), and thesauri (preferred, variant, and related terms organized in a semantic network). The chapter emphasizes the different thesauri, their standards (ISO 2788, BS 5723, AFNOR NFZ 47-100, DIN 1463, ANSI/NISO Z39.19) and their semantic relationships (equivalence, hierarchical, and associative). Importance is given to Faceted Classification by S.R. Ranganathan that states which everything can be classified on personality, matter, energy, space, and time. The authors translate these categories for the business world to the terms: topic, product, document type, audience, geography, and price, which is more practical and concrete than the original faceted classification. For the information architect this means that more and more web sites can be easily search integrated in the future.

Week 4

2008-09-16T08:30:00.001-07:00

Chapter 7: Navigation Systems

There two main types of Navigation Systems: Embedded which exist within the content of the web site, and Supplemental, stand on their own. Embedded Navigation systems include global, local, and contextual systems. Supplemental Navigation systems are sitemaps, indexes, and guides. As we learned from our previous class, Instructional Graphics, there are many ways to position and create those navigation systems. Top, left, or right positioning of the global navigation is not only a personal preference of the designer, but it is based on user preference. Many web sites create graphics with rollovers that serve as their global navigation. Cascading menus and pull-downs are now almost a requirement for some users (not for all) to rate a site as hip. Contextual labels often accompany icons. Both complement each other. At first the user reads the text and later uses visual images to right page. The most important task for global navigation systems is to be consistent on all the pages. The more complex and big the web site is the more problems would pose to the information architect to create workable system. In addition to that, not all users go to the home page first. Local navigation systems can effectively add a site by providing better coverage and allowing users to better browse the content. Like global navigation systems, local navigation systems have to be uniform and give better access to subpages.
In contrast to global and local navigation systems, contextual navigation is specific to text and varies from page to page. The book made a great point that contextual systems promote associative learning. The contextual links are underlined as a standard.
Not all web sites have supplemental navigation systems, but it has become a requirement for the large ones. Sitemaps are used by hierarchical web sites. They are easy to construct and allow the user to scan fast and find the right information in no time. In contrast, site indexes might be a little harder to create, and they follow alphabetical order. For very large sites controlled vocabulary has to be established for uniformity along with term rotation called permutation. Site indexes can be manually or automatically generated depending on their size. The supplemental navigation system, guides, is usually unnoticed by most users. They remind me of a help button where the user can tour and learn from tutorials how to use the site. Usually, they are linear accompanied with snapshots and text. The last one of this category is the Search. Poor IA can push the users to the search button (see chapter 8 for additional comments).
Other navigation approaches are personalization, customization, visualization and social navigation.

Web Sites

2008-09-10T03:16:00.001-07:00

http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/searchanalytics/

I really like this publisher’s web site. Rosenfeld Media publishes books on user experience, and is one of the leading publishers in this field. It is created with good humor and professionalism. “Rosenfeld Media's authors are insane; they take breathers from pounding out their prose to speak all over the planet. The remainder of our 2008 events calendar includes appearances in Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, India, Italy, Turkey, and all across the USA.” It is very easy to scan and browse the information. It links to helpful external information. Global and Local navigation bars are very clear and consistent throughout the web site. It does implement what it preaches.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contextual_design

The article offer a very interesting technique to find how and what users do or not based on “ethnographic methods for gathering data relevant to the product, field studies, rationalizing workflows, system and designing human-computer interfaces.” Search analytics and contextual design complement each other, although the later might be more costly and time consuming. Five models were created to help visualize and understand how this method works: flow, sequence, cultural, artifact and physical.

What struck me from this article was that even the physical environment might play an important role in IA. Most people forget this factor of the equati

Flow Model

Part of an Affinity Diagram

Week 3

2008-09-08T08:40:00.001-07:00

Chapter 5: Organization Systems

I remember arguing about classification for a book in our library with the cataloguer. Her decision did not make sense to me. I wanted the book on a specific type of cheese to be classified with the other books on diary products, but she was insisted that the book had to be given a call number to reflect the cattle industry. I thought that patrons would never find the book. So, I was glad that this chapter begins with Ambiguity. People even speak with a language that can be is obscure and ambiguous. Sometimes the gestures and intonation of the voice will give away the right meaning. To organize any web site the information architect needs to submerge into the culture of the organization and its users. Heterogeneity, difference in perspectives, and internal politics are also important and pose challenges to information organization.
Each web site can be sketched and divided into different schemes and structures. The organizational schemes are divided into two major categories: Exact and Ambiguous. The Exact Schemes are subdivided into alphabetically, chronologically (like a blog), and geographically (by continents, cities, etc.). The Ambiguous Organization Schemes are subjective, and therefore, they mirror the language of the organization and its users. Clearly, an information architect needs to find the right language for the web when designing a company’s page on specific topics, tasks, audiences, and metaphors, or when mixing them in a hybrid scheme. Is the choice successful and if not what needs to be improved? Organizational structures of web sites are as important as schemes. This is the first step is to draw a visible understanding of what overall organization would be implemented. Usually I draw a chart of my web site hierarchy to see how distribute my pages. Depending on the topic it can be narrow and deep or broad and shallow. Planning for future development is also important. On the first pages I try not to overload the user, but simply to hook their interest. Long documents might be separated into categories or attached as PDF files. I use hyperlinks to link similar information. Hyperlinks offer instantaneous reference to other documents. In the chapter the authors talk about the Database Model when there is a lot of information to be represented and also discuss social classification. Web 2.0 is a great way to share information and to check how other people tag their favorite web sites.

Chapter 6: Labeling Systems

The chapter starts with a definition: “Labeling is a form of representation.” People always try to label things. It is in their nature. The question is do they always label them the same way. This provides some food for thought. When we communicate with others we use more than just words. On the web, we have just printed words to rely on. There are no gestures or voice intonation to help us with ambiguous meanings. Company jargon, misused or misspelled words can turn away potential clients. That is why, it is important to develop clear labeling systems.
Labels can be contextual links (describing the hyperlinks), headings, navigation systems, index terms, and icons (picture).
Designing labels is one of the most difficult tasks in the creation of a web site. It comes down again to content, user and context. A consistent label system has to the one of the first things developed. It is easy to see what others have done, to “study, learn and borrow” some of the ideas. Many web masters bookmark websites with the tag “inspiration” when they are working on projects.
The book emphasized developing labeling systems, not labels. What’s the difference? We can always name (label) things, but it is harder to organize them in a consistent way. Style, presentation, syntax, granularity, comprehensiveness, and audience are some ways mentioned. Putting all labels in a table can visualize the system and catch all the inconsistency. No matter what system we use, we should recognize the users’ needs first.

Information Architecure Lecture

2008-09-02T15:28:00.000-07:00

Ambient Findability

http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feature_wdesc.php?rec=3903

This is also very informative PowerPoint that explains IA:

Information architecture - Introduction

From: donnam, 2 years ago

Information architecture - Introduction

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: information architecture wireframe)

A basic introduction to information architecture - classification schemes & structures, information architecture design, navigation design, wireframes. From 2005, university lectures

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Week 2

2008-09-01T07:30:00.000-07:00

Chapter 3: User Needs and Behaviors

The most important aspect of IA is understanding the users’ needs. Without knowing who they are and what they want, it is difficult to design an effective web site. The users do not care how the information is organized; they just want to find what they are looking for. Many librarians would tell you that patrons/users sometimes do not know what they want exactly when they are asking a reference question, and only during the reference interview, can the librarian lead the patron/user to the right information source. In real life these are the majority of users. The chapter goes further by dividing the group into the users who are looking for the right answer, users who find some information on a topic, users that want almost everything written on the topic and users that want to use and remember the information for later use. It is important to mention that users do not seek and find the information the same way. That means that “searching, browsing and asking” behaviors are in a way predetermined by the background of the user. The common denominator in this behavior is the “berry-picking” model by Dr. Marcia Bates. That is, everybody starts their searching at a certain place and picks chunks of information called “berries” as they go till they find the necessary information. Another method mentioned in the book is “pearl-growing” in which a user finds what they want and then wants more of the sort. The chapter ends with a responsibility placed on the shoulders of every information architect - to learn about users’ behavior. The authors recommended search analytics and contextual inquiry.

Chapter 4: The Anatomy of Information Architecture

To visualize IA, the Information Architecture Institute web site’s diagrams are really helpful for explaining how everything works. The chapter divided the different components of a web site into organization systems, navigation systems, search systems and labeling systems. It is worth mentioning that in some cases search results can be created by a group of people and those sifted results are better than the machine generated ones. Most library web sites have portals created by librarians to other authoritative sites saving patrons a lot of time and effort in their searches.

http://iainstitute.org/

The IA portal, Information Architecture Institute, offers a variety of topics. It is probably the first place to check for information and also to get help. The web site organization is pretty simple but packed with information. The information division is clear and relatively easy to find. The web site design can be perfected. Learning IA is a starting point. The IA library contains free articles, papers, suggestions for books, presentations, organizations, conferences, mailing lists, columns, journals, blogs, web sites and resources. Not all of them are in English. The library is very easy to browse by Subject, Resource Type, Authors, and Language. The other option was the IA Tools, which contains presentation documents helping professionals visualize the IA work to others. Most of the documents were created with a program called Visio. It is a MS program that can draw charts and graphs. Under the IA Education one can find IA Glossary, Selected Books, Schools Teaching IA, Careers in IA, and Educational Curriculum. The glossary can be downloaded, which makes it extremely helpful for a novice. I found it interesting to learn that Florida State offers IA not only in their Library and Information program, but also in their IT program. USF is not mentioned. Under the IA Research tab is the Salary Survey. I found interesting that women are 51% of the workforce and they even earn more than their male counterparts.

http://www.iasummit.org/2008/

This web site is very well organized. It is so easy to find the necessary information. The top navigation bar is very clean and inviting. This year’s conference was in Miami, Florida in April. The student non-member rate was $405. The conference offered more than 45 workshops on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Each presentation can be downloaded. Unfortunately, I could not downloaded a file from the conference, but I enjoyed snooping in the Crowdvine, where different IA specialists post their comments on variety of topics, including politics and short bios.

Semantic Studios
http://www.semanticstudios.com/ - Peter Morville's IA consulting firm.

This is a very interesting web site from which I have learned so much about IA. Peter Morville, the founder of Semantic Studios, keeps a column on the first page. The column is chronologically organized and offers variety of topics. Each topic offers an additional bibliography that deserves a glance at least. I have ordered some of the books, including his book, Ambient Fundability: What We Find Changes Who We Become. Unfortunately, it is not updated regularly. The last entry was in July 2007. It is very easy to navigate throughout this website.

2Advanced Studios
http://2advanced.com/

I love this web site. It is so easy to navigate and offers a lot of information. The nav bar expands depending on the subject. It gives a great option to expand to the secondary and tertiary destinations. There are also auxiliary destinations. I have not seen something like that before. The site is very visual and facilitates scanning.

Week 1

2008-08-25T07:02:00.001-07:00

podcast by UNCChapelHill

Chapter 1: Defining Information Architecture

The first chapter starts with three questions and tries to answer them in the best manner possible. The first one “What is (and isn’t) information architecture” is the one that hasn’t given me a break since I signed up for this class. I thought that Information Architecture (IA) is primarily based on a specific classification that helps define a web site. For me it was the supporting frame of a structure called a web site. Apparently, I was not far off, but that does not necessarily mean that I was right. The authors define Information Architecture in four steps:
1. The structural design of shared information environments.
2. The combination of organization, labeling, search, and navigation systems within web sites and intranets.
3. The art and science of shaping information products and experiences to support usability and findability.
4. An emerging discipline and community of practice focused on bringing principles of design and architecture to the digital landscape.(Morville, 2007)

The definition was not a short one, but it was a start to explain what IA was. I really enjoyed the part where the authors were trying to explain IA to others. I think that their answers were different depending on the person’s experience and background. They related the information in a way that was most understandable for the other party. IA architects create perpetually changing concepts depending on the circumstances but in the users’ content and context system. For me IA was created to help users find information on a web site with minimum effort. This might not be the whole explanation for IA, but for now I decided to take it and move on to the next section and learn what IA is. Surprisingly, the authors defined what IA is not. Sometimes it is easy to start describing something by saying what it is not and thus draw the lines between similar notions. The following disciplines are not IA: Content Management, Graphic design, Enterprise Architecture, Experience Design, Interaction Design, Knowledge Management, Software Development, and Usability Engineering.

Chapter 2: Practicing Information Architecture

The first time I learn about IA was when a friend of mine got a job as an information architect. I was wondering what qualified her to be an information architect; a MLS degree, HTML and CSS or other kind knowledge? I remember that I could not grasp the idea of IA at the time, probably because her explanation was not clear and did not touch my experience.
I found that people from different backgrounds, such as library and information science, graphic and web design, journalism, marketing, architecture, product management, etc., can be information architects. I asked then the same question that the authors posed in Chapter 2: “Do we need Information Architects?” (Morville, 2007). Web site creation happens with or without IA, it is similar to a plant that grows with or without fertilizer. The fertilized plant will outgrow and produce a better crop than the unfertilized plant. The same goes when we are dealing with web sites. What is important are the end results. Can an organization afford to lose customers and money in today’s extremely competitive society? Of course, it can’t. Major organizations have information architects in their teams. Others might prefer to use IA consulting firms. In this edition, the authors strive for balance between “Innies and Outies,” meaning a company has to find the balance between hiring personnel as information architects and contracting an outside IA consulting firm. Both methods contribute differently, the “innies” have a better grasp of how the organization works and what its needs are, but the “outies” can foresee problems and suggest a new way of doing things. At the end, it all comes back to the three main aspects in IA, users, content and context, without these it is hard to understand IA.