[Sigia-l] Integrating New Topics into Advanced Search Screen

[Avi Rappoport]

At 4:42 PM -0800 1/16/03, Mary Taylor wrote:
>The major dilemma for the project is whether to
>integrate these two separate content groups (each has a set of digital
>images, catalog records, and educational materials) into one search
>screen (which would allow for combining transportation and agriculture
>topics) or maintaining two separate search screens for each one.  Anyone
>with thoughts on the subject.

I've encountered sites with multiple back end data sources, but all 
my research shows that users don't expect to have different search 
engines.  For example, two different health care sites I've worked on 
had separate searches for health info, coverage, caregivers and 
prescription drugs, but the search log analysis showed that users 
could not tell the difference.

I'd recommend starting with a universal search and making a very 
clear option to specify transportation vs. agriculture.  If you have 
room in the general navigation area, put a search field with 
checkboxes for the two areas.  If not, you can always do it on the 
results page.

But the principal of "people expect site search to be like web 
search" is a good one to remember.

Avi
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