For week 4, we were required to read chapters seven, eight and nine of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web by authors Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld. Chapter seven deals with navigation systems which are designed to help users find what they are looking for and avoid getting lost in a myriad of websites. Morville and Rosenfeld (2007) have stated that, “getting lost in a large website can be confusing and frustrating. Navigation tools are needed to provide context and to allow for greater flexibility” (p. 115). When a user begins the process of navigating a larger website, there are several elements subsystems that are in place. Firstly there are global, local, and contextual navigation systems that are incorporated inside the web pages which are called embedded navigation systems.
The global or site-wide systems enable the user to ascend the hierarchy of the site and allows them to rapidly navigate to a completely different area of the site. With local navigation systems the goal is to help users investigate the existing sections of the site such as in the Florida Today newspaper where there are subsites for real estate and job opportunities. As for contextual navigation systems, these can be used to balance navigation systems that are already been established by providing an additional degree of flexibility. These systems routinely appear as hypertext links in the content. Website designers introduce hyperlinks when they need to break away from website hierarchy and make a lateral shift to pages that are associated to the content of the current page. The authors recommend that website designers employ restraint when adding hypertext links in order to avoid confusing and overwhelming the user.
The authors also discuss supplemental navigation systems. According to the textbook (2007), “These systems can include sitemaps, indexes and guides. These are external to the basic hierarchy of a web site and provide complementary ways of finding content and completing tasks” (p. 131). These were very interesting to read as it shows how these are designed to further assists users. I was most familiar with index and guides as I have encountered them many times in my research. Guides, which can take the form of tours and tutorials, have probably been the most help to me.
Chapter eight deals with search systems and how they work, their anatomy and so forth. In beginning the chapter the authors recommend that one thinks twice before beginning the process of making their web site searchable. Morville and Rosenfeld (2007), “suggest you consider the following questions before committing to a search system for your site: Does your site have enough content, will investing in search systems divert resources from more useful navigation systems?, do you have the time and know-how to optimize your site’s search system?, are there better alternatives? Will your site’s users bother with search?” (p. 146-147). These questions will help to determine if making your web site searchable is a good option. Search can be a good thing as it helps when a site has a lot of data to look through or is fragmented. It can also be a great learning tool for designers as it can help them to learn what searchers want.
When it comes to the anatomy of a search system, there are several things that make them up such as tool for indexing and spidering, algorithms for processing your request into something that the software can recognize, and search interfaces. Additionally, the authors discuss how to design a search system such as selecting the content, implementing algorithms, how to present the results, and how to list the results.
Chapter nine covers thesauri, controlled vocabularies and metadata, all of which I was quite familiar with. Metadata is a term I know well from my other classes and I know that it can be used to describe many types of data and materials. According to authors Morville and Rosenfeld (2007), “Metadata tags are used to describe documents, pages ,images, software, video and audio files and other content objects for the purposes of improved navigation and retrieval” (p. 194). Controlled vocabularies can vary in their shape and size and can be either a list of equivalent terms in the form of a synonym ring which links a group of words that are labeled as equivalent for the purpose of information recovery. Or they can be a list of preferred terms in the shape of an authority file and are most often used by libraries and in government organizations to describe the proper names for items in a narrower domain. When it comes to thesauri, this is something that many people would be familiar with and have used on a regular basis and according to the textbook (2007), “a thesaurus is a controlled vocabulary in which equivalence, hierarchical, and associative relationships are identified for purposes of improved retrieval” (p. 203). The authors identify three types of thesauri that a designer should choose from when building a web site.
They are the classic thesaurus that identifies query terms that correspond to the existing vocabulary of the thesaurus and enables the user to do hierarchical browsing and associative linking; the indexing thesaurus which helps to build up and organize the indexing process for greater uniformity and effectiveness, and it enables the designer to construct searchable indexes of preferred terms which helps users to locate documents concerning the particular subject that they are researching from one access point. Lastly there is the searching thesaurus that “leverages a controlled vocabulary at the point of searching, but not the point of indexing. When a user enters a search term into the search engine, a searching thesaurus can map that term onto the controlled vocabulary before executing the query against the full-text index” (p. 212). All of these are designed to help the user to better navigate the search engines and increase the likelihood of finding what they need. I personally like the metadata and the thesauri best in terms of the success I have had with them.
All in all, these chapters really delved into the navigational and searching aspects of the web and while it was a lot to absorb, it was certainly a big help in learning how they work and how to apply them to real life. Chapters seven and nine were the most interesting for me as I can really get a sense of how the topics they discussed are utilized in everyday life.