November 29, 2012 by James Robertson
Intranet information architecture (IA) can be notoriously difficult to get right. Depending on the size and geographical spread of an organisation, an intranet can be required to serve a small team, or a global conglomerate and there are many different potential audiences. The article What is information architecture? provides an overview of the discipline itself [...]
Tags: Information architecture, Intranets, personalisation, usability
May 5, 2010 by James Robertson
Peter Morville and Jeffery Callender explore the design of faceted navigation. To quote: Also called guided navigation and faceted search, the faceted navigation model leverages metadata fields and values to provide users with visible options for clarifying and refining queries. Faceted navigation is arguably the most significant search innovation of the past decade.[2] It features [...]
Tags: design patterns, faceted navigation, patterns, search
March 9, 2010 by James Robertson
I’ve just spent a day with a well-known global company at their headquarters in Sweden (and no, it’s not IKEA). They are in the early stages of a large intranet project, which has been thrown a curve-ball by a huge global reorganisation. My role in this one-off day of consulting was to provide expert insight [...]
February 10, 2010 by James Robertson
Deane Barker asks the question: what is metadata in content management systems? To quote: I going to try and impugn one of the great concepts of content management: metadata. I’m going to argue that in the world of Web content management (WCM), it doesn’t really exist. Well, it might, but if it does, it’s awfully [...]
December 11, 2009 by James Robertson
Dave Obrien has posted details on tree testing, a mechanism for evaluating a draft information architecture. To quote: As we started experimenting with “card-based classification” on paper, it became clear that, while the technique was simple, it was tedious to create the cards on paper, recruit participants, record the results manually, and enter the data [...]
Tags: card-based classification evaluation, tree testing, usability testing