[Sigia-l] Still Defining the Damn Thing
Richard_Dalton at Vanguard.com
Richard_Dalton at Vanguard.com
Mon Feb 3 13:28:34 EST 2003
I agree 100% with Christina Wodtke and others who have the opinion that we
need more
definition of Information Architecture (and other related disciplines). To
that end
I offer yet another definition (in what I hope is simple, plain-talk
language).
Comments and discussion are welcome - if you don't want to discuss it
(again) on this
mailing list, then why don't those of us who do find somewhere we can -
suggestions welcome.
- Richard Dalton
"Finding vs Using" - A User Driven Definition
=============================================
This debate is being discussed mainly within the context of Websites.
Users face
(at least) 2 major challenges when using Websites:
1. Finding "things".
2. Using the "things" once they've found them.
I suggest that:
- Information Architecture is the discipline of organizing and
providing navigation
to "things" in such a way that users can find them.
- Interaction Design (or whatever you want to call it) is the
discipline of designing
the "things" such that users can use them once they've found them.
I realize the term "things" could use some work - i'd loosely define it as
"content or functionality that helps a user complete their task".
I would include the following within the realm of I/A: User Research to
identify
discrete User Tasks, Creation of Mental Model Diagrams using User Tasks,
Content Inventories (including Metadata), Taxonomy & Labelling, Searching
Systems,
"Traditional" Information Architecture Diagrams, Page Layouts or
Frameworks that
show placement of global navigation elements, etc, etc.
And the following within the realm of I/D: User Research & Task Analysis
to drive
Workflows of discrete User Tasks, Local Navigation (navigation between
pages within
a discrete "thing"), Page Design (selection & placement of task specific
content
or functionality on the page).
There does not seem to be a huge of overlap in the skills used to organize
information
to help people find it at a macro level (cognitive psychology, LIS?, etc)
vs those
used to help someone interact with an interface (HCI, graphic design,
etc).
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