Metadata and Taxonomies for More Flexible Information Architecture

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Presentation by Amy J. Warner, Ph.D at Information Architecture Summit, March 16, 2002

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Amy J. Warner, Ph.D.

The LIS Foundations of IA

A Presentation Made at the University of Arizona SIRLS

Amy J. Warner, Ph.D.

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Who I Am

• Independent consultant in taxonomy & metadata design and information architecture

• Formerly Thesaurus Design Specialist with Argus Associates, Inc.

• Faculty member in library and information science at University of Wisconsin-Madison (1985-1988) and University of Michigan (1989-2000)

• Co-author of Information Retrieval Today• Fortune 500 consulting

Amy J. Warner, Ph.D. (warneramyj@yahoo.com)

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Outline

• What is IA?– IA defined– Why IA is important– Basic concepts and building blocks of IA

• IA in context– IA and users– IA and business context

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Definition of IA

The art and science of structuring and organizinginformation systems to help people achieve their goals.

The application of principles and methods of libraryand information science (LIS) to the design of corporate intranets and websites.

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Why Is IA Important• Costs

– To the user• Finding information (time, # of clicks, frustration,

precision)

• Not finding information (recall, frustration)

– To the organization (lost revenue, competition)

• Value of learning (related products, services, projects, people)

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Why Is IA Important

• Wasted expense: most sites will waste between $1.5M and $2.1M on redesign next year

• Forfeited revenue: poorly architected retail sites are underselling by as much as 50%

• Lost customers: the sites we tested are driving away up to 40% of repeat traffic

• Eroded brand: people who have a bad experience typically tell 10 others

Web Site Statistics

Forrester ResearchWhy Most Web Sites Fail (Sept. ‘96)

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Why Is IA Important

• Employees spend 35% of productive time searching for information online (Working Council for Chief Information Officers)

• Managers spend 17% of their time (6 weeks a year) searching for information (Information Ecology, Thomas Davenport & Lawrence Prusack)

• Sun’s usability experts calculated that 21,000 employees were wasting an average of six minutes per day due to inconsistent intranet navigation structures. When lost time was multiplied by staff salaries, the estimated productivity loss exceeded $10M per year (Web Design and Development, Jakob Nielsen [Sept. 1997)

Intranet Statistics

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Why IA Fails

• ‘Internet time’

• Cultural issues--developers, librarians, managers

• Project management

• Underestimating the problem– Thinking it’s easy– Good IA is ‘invisible’

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Why IA Is Hard• Expectations

– Underestimating time/cost– Underestimating difficulty of task

• Diversity: goals, users, authors• Heterogeneous content / objects• Relevance is subjective and situational• Organization & language are ambiguous

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Making IA a Manageable Problem

• Identify and address the major needs of major audiences

• Remove old, outdated content (ROT)

• Enable precision

• Design for the 80/20 rule

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Basic Concepts/Components of IA

• Organization systems

• Navigation systems

• Labeling systems

• Searching systems

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Organization Systems

• Organization scheme– defines the shared characteristics of content items and

influences the logical grouping of those items– identify through content inventory– types

• exact--divide information into well-defined and mutually exclusive groups (alphabetical, chronological, geographical)

• ambiguous--divide information into categories that are not exactly defined or necessarily mutually exclusive (topical, task-oriented, audience specific, metaphor driven

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Organization Scheme, cont.

• Organization structure– defines the principle ways in which users can navigate– often can be determined through user research– models

• hierarchy--top down– polyhierarchies– depth vs. breadth

• hypertext--nonlinear– chunking and linking

• databases--relational

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Navigation Systems• Hierarchical navigation systems--the information hierarchy is the

primary navigation system

• Global navigation systems--often enables greater vertical and lateral navigation within a site

• Local navigation systems--often used for sub-sites

• Ad hoc navigation--relationships between individual content items or groups of content items; usually embedded within a page

• Mechanisms for producing navigation systems– navigation bars– frames– pull-down menus– tables of content, indexes, site map, guide pages

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Vanguard.com Navigation

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Vanguard.com Navigation

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GlobalVolunteers.com Navigation

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Labeling Systems• Synonymy and ambiguity• Labels as links• Labels and index/search terms• Labels as headings on pages • Sources for labeling systems

– other web sites– controlled vocabularies outside, inside the organization– content– users and experts

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Subject/Contextual Clarification of Labels

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Ambiguity of Index Terms

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Synonymy of Labels on Same Page

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Inconsistency of Labeling Across Pages

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Searching Systems

• Support different types of search– comprehensiveness vs accuracy– exploration – existence

• Support different search mechanisms– Natural language vs. controlled vocabulary– Searching fields– Retrieval models (boolean, statistical, etc.)

• Integrate search and browse

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Integration of Search and Browse

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Amazon.com Advanced Search

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IA ‘Generations’

• ‘Brochureware’

• Pages served from database

• Metadata-driven website

CMS

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An Ecological Approach

Content

BusinessContext

Users

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IA From Top to BottomTop-Down Bottom-Up

portal sub-sitestrategy objectshierarchy metadataprimary path multiple paths

portal

local subsites(HR, Engineering, R&D…)

Object XName:Product Category:Topic:Stale Date:Author:Security:

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Where Does IA Fit?The Elements ofUser Experience

Jesse James Garrett

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Why Metadata-Driven Web Sites

• So Your Users Don’t Have To!

Users

Documents and Applications

Communication Chasm

ExamplePersonal Digital Assistant

SynonymsHandheld Computer

"Alternate" SpellingsPersenal Digitel Asistent

Abbreviations / AcronymsPDA

Broader TermsWireless, Computers

Narrower TermsPalmPilot, PocketPC

Related TermsWindowsCE, Cell Phones

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Epicurious.com

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Epicurious.com Facets

Beans, Beef, Berries, Cheese, Chocolate, Citrus,Dairy, Eggs, Fish, Fruits, Garlic, Ginger, Grains,Greens, Herbs, Lamb, Mushrooms, Mustard, Nuts,Olives, Onions, Pasta, Peppers, Pork, Potatoes, Poultry, Rice, Shellfish, Tomatoes, Vegetables

Main Ingredients

African, American, Asian, Caribbean, EasternEuropean, French, Greek, Indian, Italian, Jewish,Mediterranean, Mexican, Middle Eastern,Scandinavian, Spanish

Cuisine

Advance, Bake, Broil, Fry, Grill, Marinade,Microwave, No Cook, Poach, Quick, Roast, Sauté, Slow Cook, Steam, Stir Fry

Preparation Method

Christmas, Easter, Fall, Fourth of July,Hanukkah, New Years, Picnics, Spring,Summer, Superbowl, Thanksgiving, Valentine's Day, Winter

Season/Occasion

Appetizers, Bread, Breakfast, Brunch,Condiments, Cookies, Desserts, HorsD'oeuvres, Main Dish, Salads, Sandwiches,Sauces, Side Dish, Snacks, Soup, Vegetables

Course/Dish

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Epicurious, First FacetBrowse > Picnics

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Epicurious, Second Facet

Browse > Picnics > Poultry

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Bitpipe.comSearch TermBroader Term

Narrower Terms Related Terms

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Bitpipe’s CVWeb Application Software

BT Internet Application SoftwareNT eBusiness Software eCommerce Software Portal Applications SoftwareRT Internet Web Applications Architectures Web Development Tools Webmaster

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Contact: Amy J. Warnerwarneramyj@yahoo.com

Questions??

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