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In this chapter you will learn about:Organizational schemes: classification systems for organizing content into groupsOrganizational structures: defining the relationships among the groupsResearch and interview techniques: How to discover a way to organize things so people can find what they wantControlled vocabularies and thesauri
Remember:A scheme groups similar things togetherA structure shows how those groups are related
End of introductory overview; now let’s get back to the details of organizational schemes and organizational structuresAnd how we discover how users think: how they see the groupings
Supermarket is an example of an ambiguous organizational scheme
“Ambiguous” describe organizational situations where there is more than one reasonable way to group thingsFour types of ambiguous organizational schemes:
Can be impossible to represent the depth and breadth of site content in a single home page Readers often come to a Web site with specific interests or goals in mindUse the home page to split the audience immediately into interest groups
offer them specific, more relevant information in menu pages deeper within the site.
Shows group by a visual metaphor.Not many examples, because it is difficult to find metaphors that will work with all users.Possible example: pet supply store:
Breadth of a hierarchy: the number of links available at each levelDepth of a hierarchy: the number of levelsBroad shallow hierarchies offer many choices at each levelNarrow deep hierarchies require many clicks to get to the bottom levelUsers prefer broad shallow hierarchies
Database organizational structure provides a bottom-up view, whereas a hierarchy provides a top-downBoth have their placeIn a database structure the user fills in data, and is then taken directly to the right page. One click, when it works ideally.
Predetermined set of terms that describe a specific domainThere are no synonymsOnly one term describes a conceptCan help combat the ambiguity of English
Used in conjunction with a controlled vocabulary, makes searching more effectiveUser types in variant, thesaurus supplies search term from controlled vocabulary
Problem: how do you know what your users’ categories are?
Will they look for a sweater under Winter Wear or under Men’s Clothing?What do they expect to find under “About Us”?What can you put on the home page for a college that will lead most directly to the tuition?
You don’t know!Not until you ask your users . . .. . . who, of course, have no idea what you mean by “What are your categories?”
Devise a list of about 40 questions that a user might have. Or can place 40 nouns selected from the task analyses.Write each question on a card; number cards on backAsk each user to sort the cards into piles, where the cards in each pile seem related to each otherAsk the user to give a name to each pileDo this with ten or more usersDo statistical analysis of the clustering in the groups
Example: Choir Task Analyses
Keeping track of attendanceCreate attendance sheet
…Add/remove members as necessaryPrint out attendance sheet for rehearsal nightPlace attendance sheet at entry way of rehearsal venueProvide pencilsCollect attendance sheets at end of nightUpdate the list
Create attendance sheetAdd/remove members as necessaryCreate print out attendance sheet for rehearsal nightPlace attendance sheet at entry way of rehearsal venueProvide pencilsCollect attendance sheets at end of nightUpdate the list
Can be done “be eyeball,” just looking at the piles for patternsMuch better: use cluster analysis softwareSee the text’s companion website to download CardZort, by Jorge Toro of DePaul University