[Sigia-l] Serious Discussion of IA Research?

[Everett, Andy]

I've been lurking on this discussion for sometime and thought I'd speak out

The discussion of data versus information is interesting. At UW recently,
several of my professors would talk about the data, information, knowledge,
wisdom hierarchy. Each one would have their own opinions and each one would
differ from the other. The talk about knowledge and wisdom is another thread
for another time.

I agree with the majority of the discussion in this thread so far on the
data vs information.
What I always understood from my instructors was that data is fundamental.
Alone it has no meaning. Data is what an organization collects.

Information is that same data with meaning. For example, in my WSDOT world
101.50 is a data value we might collect. This could be the price of some
consumable inventory that we have such as a guardrail or the Accumulated
Route Mileage on some State Route. Without that context that datum is
meaningless, just another 2 decimal number. If the datum is considered to be
an Accumulated Route Mileage associated with a State Route I can roughly
determine a location on that State Route. If 101.5 represented State Route
5, I can tell you that you are located near Tumwater, Washington.

In my current position I deal with creating information structures. I am,
with the help of the business owners (data stewards), defining data elements
in databases based on their context, content and meaning and not their use
(information). When we are completed , we should have an accurate
representation of information within the Department, created from the bottom
up. Essentially, this will be our Departmental Information Architecture that
will allow our organization to talk about its information with one common
understanding. Right now each office within the Department has its own view
of the common information. We don't all talk with a common understanding
which leads to misunderstandings and data translated to information that may
not have only one answer depending on the source.

In my view a common enterprise information architecture allows for data
sharing and data interoperability. Information architectures ,IMHO, are
artifacts that combine the information structures of multiple database into
one structure across an organization whether they be a faceted classfication
taxonomy to organize your data or namespaces for logically finding web
services, web pages or information objects on a file system. I agree that an
Information Architect should have an understanding of databases but not be
DBAs. They, should as I have learned on the job, to be a data modeler in the
context of building databases.

Andy Everett
Data Catalog Administrator
IRM Namespace Coordinator
Office of Information Technology
Washington State Department of Transportation
Phone: 360-705-7622
Fax:360-705-6817
PO Box 47430
Olympia, WA 98504-7430
USA

''The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and
write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.''

-- Alvin Toffler



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