04 Fundamentals of UX Workshop: Information Architecture

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INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE

Designing the User Experience: THE FUNDAMENTALS

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The structural design of an information space to facilitate task completion and intuitive access to

content.

Definition

Information Architecture for the World-Wide Web Louis Rosenfeld & Peter Morville

Organizing info so

people can find stuff

>




PLAY WITH CANDY

Sort into groups. Name groups




MAKE A HOMEPAGE FOR YOUR CANDY SITE




4 KINDS OF INFORMATION SEEKING




You are going to Belize. You want the lonely planet guidebook




KNOWN ITEMhttp://boxesandarrows.com/four-modes-of-seeking-information-and-how-to-design-for-them/




What worksSearchA-Z indexNavigation

http://boxesandarrows.com/four-modes-of-seeking-information-and-how-to-design-for-them/




You want to visit a tropical island. Where should you go?




EXPLORATORY





What can helpNavigationRelated SearchSearch (with autocomplete, related terms)





Ticket Prices to Belize drop in September and April




DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW





What can helpRelated informationRecommendationsPush technologies





You saw a great waterproof camera on amazon, and now realize it’s the one you want to buy. Where did it go?




REFINDING





What can helpFavoritesPersonalizationVisited link color





RedesignDESIGN FOR TASKS

Find a after dinner mintFind a candies for a upcoming party for a 57 year oldMake users aware some candies are on saleFind again a good choice for that party that you saw earlier




Classification has Consequences

A physician who doesn’t see a new cureA poor student who can’t find financial aidA store where a product isn’t found




IA has Solutions

– Tagging with metadata– Organizing with CV’s– Creating navigation

systems – Optimizing search

Information Architecture

manages information to make it findable




CLASSIFICATION IS CONTEXTUAL




Benabar n’est pas jazz?


Dewey Decimal System‣ 200-299 – Religion Categories‣ 40+ categories related to Christianity‣ 1 for Judaism‣ 1 for Islam (& related)

Who Cares?‣ Religious Scholars‣ Librarians‣ Information Architects‣ Jews and Muslims

THIS IS A FISH

Who Cares?Hungry Catholics inland in South America on Fridays

‣ Classification reflects social and cultural organization‣ Information Architect must understand this context

Context is King

Get to know your audience…

1. Who are they?

Football Fan

Get to know your audience…

1. Who are they?

Football Fan?

Know your audience…1. Who are they?

2. What do they care about?

Are the Patriots going to make the

playoffs?

Show me photos!

What happened in the last game?

Know your audience…1. Who are they?

2. What do they care about?3. How do they think of the information and content?

Conference, division…

Schedules, standings…

Know your audience…

1. Observe others2. Study Competitors and similar sites3. Review your search logs4. Do a card sort



Now what?Check your labels. Do they make sense?







36Metadata







Tagging– when it works38




People can’t be bothered 39




Pictures of “you”




41Metadata:

what is it?“metadata is data about data"




42

Metadata: what is it?“Metadata tags are used to describe documents, pages, images, software, video and audio files, and other content objects for the purposes of improved navigation and retrieval”

‘Information Architecture for the World Wide Web’, 2nd ed., (2002)

Rosenfeld, L. & Morville, P.




DescriptiveProcuitto

Cheese

Honey

Olivia’s

Tapas




IntrinsicWhat does the camera

know? What does the

system know?




Administrative




46

Not all Metadata is equalWhat are users interested in?What do you want users to be able to find?What metadata makes management easy?

Tag content for findabilityTag content for management




47

ExerciseCANDYWrite as many descriptive words (or short phrases) on your post-itOne word (or phrase) per post-it

Don’t share– yet! Hold on!







Add pic of netflix

49




Controlled vocabularies

Master of your domains




The French Academy Founded in 1635Multiple dialectsGoal: purify the French languageGoal: unify the nation (ensure that the State and all citizens speak the same language)




The French Academy today

…but…




So what?

How will you ensure they continue to do so?

• So what are your goals?• How will you ensure that your users and your

system speak the same language?


When humans and computers interact

I’ve got

music

I want music.

Humans are good at figuring things out

Hip Hop

Rap.Rock.

Dance.

Most of the time 56

Raggamuffin

?

But computers are literal

57

Acidreggae

?

No matches found

And need help 58

AcidReggae?

?

Let’s give them “Reggae” and “Trance”

IA



59

Thus Controlled vocabularies (CV)Amy Warner defines a controlled vocabulary

(CV) as “organized lists of words and phrases, or notation systems, that are used to initially tag content, and then to find it through navigation or search.”

The IA can’t always be there…




I define them as

Documented relationships of words and concepts to assist people finding stuff.

Same dif.

Controlled Vocabularies


Simple Complex

SynonymRings

AuthorityFiles

ThesauriClassificationSchemes

Equivalence Hierarchical Associative

(Vocabularies)

(Relationships)

Controlled Vocabulary Types

Controlled vocabularies

A=B AB

A BEquivalenceChristmas=Xmas

HierarchalWinter Holidays > Christmas

Associative Christmas Tree | Santa Claus

Synonym rings• Simplest type• Helps with search, indexing• Simplifies maintenance



• Acronyms: BBC, British Broadcasting Company; MPG, miles per gallon

• Variant spellings: cancelled, canceled; honor, honour

• Scientific terms versus popular use terms: acetylsalicylic acid, aspirin; lilioceris, lily beetle– From Synonym Rings and Authority Files

by Karl Fast, Fred Leise and Mike Steckel

Synonym rings include




65

China cap = chinois = strainer


Why Bother? 66

• Sometimes on intranets, CV’s are skipped

• You think you can force people to use proper terms

• But people are lazy

I’m tired of typing “Controlled Vocabulary--- CV is shorter.

Why Bother? 67• On the internet you

want to be found• Plus users use short

queries– Average queries are 2.5

words– 30% of searches are one word queries

• On large scale sites, there is enough data to do this programmatically, but on small sites, not.

I want a cannon camera.



• Cadillac of Controlled Vocabularies• Includes associative relationships

Preferred term Variants Siblings Parent Associated

Christmas X-mas, Nöel Hanukah, Kwanzaa

Winter holidays Santa Claus

Thesauri




Associations - crafted




• Amazon uses buying patterns to determine associations

Associations - Behavioral




71

AssociationsWhat is relatedWhat is required?What else is interesting?

Relevancy is king


http://drs.yahoo.com/S=96062883/K=mouse/v=2/l=IVI/*-http:/www.georgetown.edu/departments/pharmacology/mouse.jpg



72

Implementation?Implementation dependent on situation and tools.May be slow painful data entry– know this and prepare.




73

Is that all?NO!

Life beyond enumerative classification….




74

Faceted Classification

was developed, prior to the existence of computers, by S. R. Ranganathan, a Hindu mathematician working as a librarian.




75

Ranganathan’s 5 Facets

• who: personality• what: matter• how: energy• where: space• when: time







77

Ordinary stuff?




78

Personals

Faceted classification is often used by PersonasContent is by the users




79

What’s the difference?

ElectronicsCamera

Digital

Film

PDAs

Televisions

Camera facets

Pixels

Zoom

Price




MusicEnumerative

Modern

– Rock

• Alternative

– Seattle

– Atlanta

Faceted

Mood

Tempo

Artist

Use

80




FACETS, ANYONE?Create candy facets for your store

81

Who What

HowWhereWhen




82

HEADER

This slide was left purposely blank.I can do that, you know.




83Q&A
