[Sigia-l] "meta-"navigation

[Eric Scheid]

On 5/6/05 5:59 PM, "Listera" <listera at rcn.com> wrote:

> Often, contexts are very different (i.e. my "Contact"
> example) leading to different expectations.

Heh. That isn't a strike against discriminating terms, it's an argument in
favour of. Assume these two definitions...

   Global Navigation:
        links to a site's top-level categories that occur on
        every page of the site. It may be across the top of
        the page, or arranged vertically down one side.

   Meta Navigation
        links to a site's meta-content, (or supportive,
        administrative, supplemental, or incidental, etc).
        It commonly appears at the very bottom of every
        page in a non-prominent styling, but may appear
        elsewhere on the page.

... and then between practicing Information Architects, we can ask questions
like:

   "For this particular site, is the link to the Contact Us
    page best placed in the Global Navigation, or shunted
    into the Meta Navigation block, or do we need different
    pages linked via Local Navigation?"

Alternatively, we could ask "where on the page should the contact us link
go?" ... but we must then first ask "where does global navigation go on this
page -- top? left? right?" else we presumptively influence the design.

e.