[Sigia-l] RE: Notes from IA/UX discussion on CMS

[Leo Frishberg]

Right.

The key point I wanted to make, and didn't want to take a lot of space doing
it, was that the real focus of the IA effort was in the development
documentation itself.  New documents (to IA) were introduced into our
process.  Specifically, the IA team took responsibility for creating a
content inventory matrix that went beyond simple inventory.  It included
content "ID's" that then acted as threads through the CMS.  It included
content descriptors so that content owners would know what we were referring
to.  It included content priorities (that were the responsibility of the
content owners to determine) that helped inform content well placement.  It
included recommended word count / character count maximums, and so on.

On the wireframes themselves, "static" elements were clearly delineated from
CMS elements through different line type rendering.  The number of page
"templates" was determined by  collaborative discussions with the CMS
implementation team so that end-user/content owner requirements (and
ease-of-update considerations) were balanced against
ease-of-development/implementation issues (e.g., a specific content well
could have been broken into sub-templates, or could have been kept as a
single well of information - each approach had its advantages).

The response from the content owners was very positive - it gave them the
"rules of the game" up front so that they could create a work flow that
would ultimately make the CMS approach successful.  The response from the
development team was that the inventory matrix gave them a level of control
they had not had in the past, so that they could really "design" the CMS
infrastructure from the beginning.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Doug Howell (IT) [mailto:DHOWELL at bordersgroupinc.com]
> Sent: Thursday, January 23, 2003 10:40 AM
> To: sigia-l at asis.org; lfrishberg at whitehorse.com; gunnar at langemark.com
> Subject: RE: Notes from IA/UX discussion on CMS
> 
> 
> Leo Frishberg wrote:
> 
> <q>The shift was dramatic:  rather than creating wireframes 
> that just informed
> visual designers and engineers, my wireframes now had to 
> account for the
> technology itself - an additional layer of information design in the
> development documents themselves. </q> 
> 
> Gunnar Langemark wrote:
> 
> <q>One challenge (even recently) has been that web site 
> production (including
> IA work) has not been prepared for CMS. IA deliverables like 
> wireframes and
> structure do not in their standard form account for the cool 
> stuff you can
> do with a CMS.</q>
> 
> 
> Care to describe in more detail (or refer to examples) how 
> you enhanced your deliverables (or created new ones) to 
> document the added layers of information?
> 
> Thanks
> Doug Howell
> Information Architect
> Borders Group Inc.
>