Faceted Navigation Design Tom Reamy Chief Knowledge Architect KAPS Group Knowledge Architecture Professional Services http://www.kapsgroup.com
Faceted NavigationDesign
Tom ReamyChief Knowledge Architect
KAPS Group
Knowledge Architecture Professional Services
http://www.kapsgroup.com
2
Agenda
Introduction: Three Environments
– E-Commerce, General Internet, Enterprise– Design, Research
Design Issues and Approaches– Facets, Facet Structure, Faceted Navigation
Design of the Facet Classification Conclusion
3
Facet Design: Three Environments
E-Commerce– Catalogs, small uniform collections of entities– Uniform behavior – buy this
Internet– Wildly different amount and type of content, no taggers– General Purpose – Flickr, Yahoo– Vertical Portal – selected content, more precise targets
Enterprise– More content, more types of content– Enterprise Tools – Search, ECM– Publishing Process – tagging, metadata standards
4
Three Environments: E-Commerce
5
Three Environments: E-Commerce
6
eCommerce: Common Themes
Early Adopters of Faceted Navigation– Things, Product Catalogs
Balance of information and ads– Advertiser dominance – No– Auto-ads – Obituary for Obama
Price and Type are basics 1 or 2 filters (source / type) – No
– Intersection of facets is source of power
7
8
9
10
11
Internet Design
Subject Matter taxonomy – Business Topics– Finance > Currency > Exchange Rates
Facets – Location > Western World > United States– People – Alphabetical and/or Topical - Organization– Organization > Corporation > Car Manufacturing > Ford– Date – Absolute or range (1-1-01 to 1-1-08, last 30 days)– Publisher – Alphabetical and/or Topical – Organization– Content Type – list – newspapers, financial reports, etc.
12
General Internet EnvironmentText Mining, Vertical Portals Internet Content
– Scale – impacts design and technology – speed of indexing– Limited control – Association of publishers to selection of content to none– Major subtypes – different rules – metadata and results
Complex queries and alerts– Terrorism taxonomy + geography + people + organizations
Text Mining – General or specific content and facets and categories– Dedicated tools or component of Portal – internal or external
Vertical Portal – Relatively homogenous content and users– General range of questions
13
Internet Environment: Common Themes
Standard Facets – People, Companies, Place, Industry Interactive interface – sliders, date ranges Taxonomy – just another facet?
– Keywords vs. simple taxonomy Semantics still hardest – summaries, related, rank Tag Clouds / Clusters – how useful? Common Mistake – facets not orthogonal
– Issues and Topics / Clusters and Taxonomies Good Information Architecture
– Space wars – summary or full facet display– Simplicity vs. research power
14
Automatic Facets – Special IssuesText Analytics – auto-categorization, entity extraction Scale requires more automated solutions
– More sophisticated rules Rules to find and populate existing metadata
– Variety of types of existing metadata – Publisher, title, date– Multiple implementation Standards – Last Name, First / First Name, Last
Issue of disambiguation:– Same person, different name – Henry Ford, Mr. Ford, Henry X. Ford– Same word, different entity – Ford and Ford
Number of entities and thresholds per results set / document– Usability, audience needs
Relevance Ranking – number of entities, rank of facets
15
Enterprise Environment – Example Facet / Taxonomy
Taxonomy of Subjects / Disciplines:– Science > Marine Science > Marine microbiology > Marine toxins
Facets:– Organization > Division > Group– Clients > Federal > EPA– Instruments > Environmental Testing > Ocean Analysis > Vehicle– Facilities > Division > Location > Building X– Methods > Social > Population Study– Materials > Compounds > Chemicals– Content Type – Knowledge Asset > Proposals
16
Enterprise Environment
Enterprise Content – different world– More Content, more kinds, more unstructured– Not a catalog to start – less metadata and structured content – Complexity -- not just content but variety of users and activities
Combination of human and automatic metadata – ECM– Software aided - suggestions, entities, ontologies
Enterprise – Question of Balance / strategy– More facets = more findability (up to a point)– Fewer facets = lower cost to tag documents
Dominance of Semantics– Facets and Faceted Taxonomies
17
Enterprise Design Issues - Interface
Good Information Architecture– Clutter of Facets and space wars– Number of facets and multiple types
Target Problem– Faceted navigation good for discovery and exploration– Good at reducing results sets – issue of losing information
Selection Sequence – what is best?– One facet at a time– Selection from multiple facets
• One each (adv search)• Random numbers and sequence
18
Enterprise Design Issues - General
What is the right combination of elements?– Faceted navigation, metadata, browse, search, categorized
search results, file plan
What is the right balance of elements?– Dominant dimension or equal facets– Browse topics and filter by facet
When to combine search, topics, and facets?– Search first and then filter by topics / facet– Browse/facet front end with a search box
19
Enterprise Design Issues - General
How many Facets do you need?– “Can’t we start with just 1 or 2 facets and see how it works?”
Balance of metadata overhead, findability, personalization– Distributed model reduces cost – enables more facets– ECM – publishing process, policy– Distributed taggers – users, user communities (2.0), KM-Library– Auto Populate – Organization, Location– Software – entity extraction, summarization, auto-categorization
Rule of Thumb: – Small catalog of homogenous items 3-4– Enterprise content – 6-8
20
Enterprise Design Issues – Special Topics
Publisher / creator– Organization or Author – user preference, size
Internal Structure – Is it OK to have a facet organized by another facet?– Organization as a facet and as internal structure of the Facilities
facet
Candidates – don’t need a universal set that everyone agrees on– Location important for some, but not others
Hidden facets – only show up when the content calls for it?– Some content has special facets – price– Only shows up if intersection contains items with price metadata
21
Designing Faceted Classification Systems
Match the structure to domain and task– Users can understand different structures
Level of Structure related to size of domain– Alphabetical – list, range
Number of Facets vs. Internal structure– People – list or sub-structure – organizations, functions, etc.
Labeling– Systematic coherence vs. user labels, tasks
Balance – number of items vs. complete model– 12th cent – 3 items– 17th cent – 3,058
Precision of unit values – very important!
22
Designing Faceted Classification SystemsSelection of Facets: Theory
Issue - Complete Model of a domain Ranganathan – PMEST
– Personality – Person, animal, event– Matter – what x is made of– Energy – how x changes– Space – where x is– Time – when x happens
Three Planes – Idea, Verbal, Notational
23
Designing Faceted Classification Systems:Selection of Facets - Complete Model of a domainBliss Bibliographic Classification (BC2)
Thing / Entity Kind Part Property Material Process Operation
Patient Product By-product Agent Space Time
24
Designing Faceted Classification SystemsSelection of Facets: Practice Wine.com
Region– Australia, California
Type– Red Wine, White, Bubbly
Winery – Alphabetical listing
Price– $25 and below– $25-$50
Top Rated Wines– 90+ under $20
Top Sellers– Cabinet Sauvignon– Pinot Noir
Hot Features– Wine outlet– Sideways collection
25
Designing Faceted Classification SystemsSelection of Facets: Practice Flamenco Architecture Search – Marti Hearst
Periods– 17th-18th century
Locations– Africa, Western Europe
Source– Person, catalog, schools
Materials– Chalk, clay
View Types– City views, drawings
Building Names– White House
Concepts– Cultural, Economic
People– Artist, Developer
Styles– Ancient, Mediterranean
Structure Types– Building, Human Settlements
26
Designing Faceted Classification SystemsKAPS Group Enterprise Taxonomy
Basic Six Dimensions– People
• individuals and communities
– Event – Location– Time– Entities/ Things– Information Resource –
types
Custom – Products / Services
• Applications / Technologies
Combine with subject matter taxonomies
Rules – Attributes – credit limit– Function – credit
management
27
Conclusions: Design
Find the right blend of pure facets, hybrid facets, taxonomies, faceted taxonomies, ontologies, etc.
– Design for your situation – eCommerce , Internet, or Enterprise Documents – more complicated than products, later start
– Need facets plus taxonomies, semantics Integrated design is essential – not facets as add on Dynamic classification is better than pre-coordinated structures
– Combine formal power with ability to support multiple user perspectives
– Formal taxonomies are best for dynamic classification
Questions?
KAPS Group
Knowledge Architecture Professional Services
http://www.kapsgroup.com