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ADMINISTRATION

Components of an Information Architecture
By: O'Reilly Media
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    2008-06-05

    Table of Contents:
  • Components of an Information Architecture
  • Browsing Aids
  • Search Aids
  • Content and Tasks
  • Invisible Components

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    Components of an Information Architecture


    (Page 1 of 5 )

    In this conclusion to a two-part article on the anatomy of an information architecture, we take a close look at its typical components. It is excerpted from chapter four of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, Third Edition, written by Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld (O'Reilly, ISBN: 0596527349). Copyright © 2007 O'Reilly Media, Inc. All rights reserved. Used with permission from the publisher. Available from booksellers or direct from O'Reilly Media.

    Information Architecture Components

    It can be difficult to know exactly what components make up an information architecture. Users interact directly with some, while (as we saw above) others are so behind the scenes that users are unaware of their existence.

    In the next four chapters, we’ll present and discuss information architecture components by breaking them up into the following four categories:

    Organization systems
      
    How we categorize information, e.g., by subject or
       chronology. See Chapter 5.

    Labeling systems
       How we represent information, e.g., scientific
       terminology (“Acer”) or lay terminology (“maple”). See
       Chapter 6.

    Navigation systems
      
    How we browse or move through information, e.g.,
       clicking through a hierarchy. See Chapter 7.

    Searching systems
      
    How we search information, e.g., executing a search
       query against an index. See Chapter 8.

    Like any categorization scheme, this one has its problems. For example, it can be difficult to distinguish organization systems from labeling systems (hint: you organize content into groups, and then label those groups; each group can be labeled in different ways). In such situations, it can be useful to group objects in new ways. So before we delve into these systems, we’ll present an alternative method of categorizing information architecture components. This method is comprised of browsing aids, search aids, content and tasks, and “invisible” components.

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       · This article is an excerpt from the book "Information Architecture for the World...
     

    Buy this book now. This article is excerpted from chapter four of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, Third Edition, written by Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld (O'Reilly, ISBN: 0596527349). Check it out today at your favorite bookstore. Buy this book now.

       

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