Information Architects Wurman Pdf

1. Information Architects Richard Saul Wurman Pdf

Information architecture (IA) focuses on organizing, structuring, and labeling content in an effective and sustainable way. The goal is to help users find information and complete tasks. To do this, you need to understand how the pieces fit together to create the larger picture, how items relate to each other within the system.Why a Well Thought Out IA Matters, the purpose of your IA is to help users understand where they are, what they’ve found, what’s around, and what to expect. As a result, your IA informs the through identifying word choice as well as informing and through playing a role in the and processes.What You Need to KnowTo be successful, you need a diverse understanding of industry standards for creating, storing, accessing and presenting information.

Lou Rosenfeld and Peter Morville in their book, Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, note that the main components of IA:. Organization and: How you categorize and structure information.

Labeling Systems: How you represent information. Navigation Systems: How users browse or move through information. Search Systems: How users look for informationIn order to create these systems of information, you need to understand the interdependent nature of users, content, and context. Rosenfeld and Morville referred to this as the “information ecology” and visualized it as a venn diagram. Each circle refers to:.

Context: business goals, funding, politics, culture, technology, resources, constraints. Content: content objectives, document and data types, volume, existing structure, governance and ownership. Users: audience, tasks, needs, information-seeking behavior, experienceIA Sub-SpecialtiesSince the field of IA is complex and when dealing with large information systems the task becomes more massive, sometimes experts choose a specialized niche within the discipline.

Some examples of IA sub-specialties include focusing on search schemas, metadata, taxonomy, etc.References. The Elements of User Experience: User-Centered Design for the Web and Beyond (2nd Edition) by Jesse James Garrett. Information Architecture for the World Wide Web: Designing Large-Scale Web Sites by Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld., Web Style Guide 3rd Edition.

Information Architects Richard Saul Wurman Pdf

Organising functionality and content into a structure that people are able to navigate intuitively doesn’t happen by chance. Organisations must recognise the importance of information architecture or else they run the risk of creating great content and functionality that no one can ever find.This article provides an introduction to information architecture, discusses the evolution of the discipline and provides a 9-step guide for how to create an effective information architecture.It also discusses the relationship between information architecture and usability, in the context of real-world projects. The problem: finding is the new doingComputer systems used to be frustrating because they did very little quite badly.

People using systems became frustrated because they simply weren’t capable of doing what they were required to do.But technology has progressed and now technology can do practically whatever people want it to do. So why doesn’t everyone using a computer have a large smile on their face?The shear wealth of functionality and information has become the new problem. The challenge facing organisations is how to guide people through the vast amount of information on offer, so they can successfully find the information they want and thus find value in the system?Intuitive navigation doesn’t happen by chance The cost of failureNot only is this extremely frustrating for users, but it has serious repercussions for organisations. For intranets it means low adoption rates and staff reverting to unsupported off-line resources.

For websites with online shopping facilities it has a significant impact on revenue. Research suggests that a significant number of shopping attempts fail not because the user has evaluated the products on offer and decided against a purchase, but because the navigation system has failed and user can’t find the product they are interested in.This problem is only set to get worse as the quantity of information available through sites increases.

What can an organisation do to increase the chances that people can successfully navigate their site and find the information they require?