Organizing Your Content For Your Users
Information Architecture refers to how a grouping of information is organized. Hierarchy used to suffice, but with the advent of the web, and with the New Media advancing as it is, factoids disconnected from any context have become common... Traditional print media organize the presentation of information hierarchically, and control the sequence of delivery. The web is interactive.
Control of the sequence of delivery is still possible, but defeats the very nature of the technology itself. People click, and WANT to click, to get to what they want, where they want, when they want. Organizing information hierarchically may still be useful, but is it the best way for the web?
What other ways are there ?
So how would you organize information on the web? This site is one example (hopefully) of a good way to do it. People can search, browse, and dig down deep for detail. Other than hierarchy, there are webs of information, groupings based on similarities or divergences, and groupings based on other preferences.
Methods for grouping and ordering interactive data access are diverse and evolving. Typically, a well designed architecture for information on a website will use hybrid groupings of various sorts. What should you do? How does the architecture of the information impact the graphical user interface design? How does your choice of graphics affect the architecture, or does it?
This area of the site contains articles, notes, and links to other resources that will help you answer these questions. |
|
AWM Resource Area Sponsors |
|
|
Resource Links
|
|
|
|
Information Architecture
