Designing Web Navigation
The focus of this book is on creating navigation systems for large, information-rich sites serving a business purpose. At times, it also assumes you are working in a large project team with diverse roles.
Designing Web Navigation
Part I: Foundations of Web Navigation
Chapter 1. Introducing Web Navigation
Section 1.1. CONSIDERING NAVIGATION
Section 1.2. THE NEED FOR NAVIGATION
Section 1.3. WEB NAVIGATION DESIGN
Section 1.4. SUMMARY
Section 1.5. QUESTIONS
Section 1.6. FURTHER READING
Chapter 2. Understanding Navigation
Section 2.1. INFORMATION SEEKING
Section 2.2. SEEKING INFORMATION ONLINE
Section 2.3. WEB BROWSING BEHAVIOR
Section 2.4. INFORMATION SHAPE
Section 2.5. EXPERIENCING INFORMATION
Section 2.6. SUMMARY
Section 2.7. QUESTIONS
Section 2.8. FURTHER READING
Chapter 3. Mechanisms of Navigation
Section 3.1. STEP NAVIGATION
Section 3.2. PAGING NAVIGATION
Section 3.3. BREADCRUMB TRAIL
Section 3.4. TREE NAVIGATION
Section 3.5. SITE MAPS
Section 3.6. DIRECTORIES
Section 3.7. TAG CLOUDS
Section 3.8. A–Z INDEXES
Section 3.9. NAVIGATION BARS AND TABS
Section 3.10. VERTICAL MENU
Section 3.11. DYNAMIC MENUS
Section 3.12. DROP-DOWN MENUS
Section 3.13. VISUALIZING NAVIGATION
Section 3.14. BROWSER MECHANISMS
Section 3.15. SUMMARY
Section 3.16. QUESTIONS
Section 3.17. FURTHER READING
Chapter 4. Types of Navigation
Section 4.1. CATEGORIES OF NAVIGATION
Section 4.2. PAGE TYPES
Section 4.3. SUMMARY
Section 4.4. QUESTIONS
Section 4.5. FURTHER READING
Chapter 5. Labeling Navigation
Section 5.1. THE VOCABULARY PROBLEM
Section 5.2. ASPECTS OF GOOD LABELS
Section 5.3. LABELING SYSTEMS
Section 5.4. PERSUASIVE LABELS
Section 5.5. TRANSLATING LABELS
Section 5.6. SOURCES OF LABELS
Section 5.7. SUMMARY
Section 5.8. QUESTIONS
Section 5.9. FURTHER READING
Part II: A Framework for Navigation Design
Chapter 6. Evaluation
Section 6.1. QUALITIES OF SUCCESSFUL NAVIGATION
Section 6.2. EVALUATION METHODS
Section 6.3. SUMMARY
Section 6.4. QUESTIONS
Section 6.5. FURTHER READING
Chapter 7. Analysis
Section 7.1. BUSINESS GOALS
Section 7.2. UNDERSTANDING CONTENT
Section 7.3. UNDERSTANDING TECHNOLOGY
Section 7.4. USER INTELLIGENCE
Section 7.5. PERFORMING PRIMARY USER RESEARCH
Section 7.6. CONSOLIDATING RESEARCH FINDINGS
Section 7.7. SCENARIOS
Section 7.8. SUMMARY
Section 7.9. QUESTIONS
Section 7.10. FURTHER READING
Chapter 8. Architecture
Section 8.1. PERSUASIVE ARCHITECTURE
Section 8.2. NAVIGATION CONCEPT
Section 8.3. INFORMATION STRUCTURES
Section 8.4. ORGANIZATIONAL SCHEMES
Section 8.5. SITE MAPS
Section 8.6. SUMMARY
Section 8.7. QUESTIONS
Section 8.8. FURTHER READING
Chapter 9. Layout
Section 9.1. DETERMINING NAVIGATION PATHS
Section 9.2. VISUAL LOGIC
Section 9.3. PAGE TEMPLATES
Section 9.4. WIREFRAMES
Section 9.5. SUMMARY
Section 9.6. QUESTIONS
Section 9.7. FURTHER READING
Chapter 10. Presentation
Section 10.1. INFORMATION DESIGN
Section 10.2. INTERACTING WITH NAVIGATION
Section 10.3. GRAPHIC DESIGN
Section 10.4. SPECIFYING NAVIGATION
Section 10.5. SUMMARY
Section 10.6. QUESTIONS
Section 10.7. FURTHER READING
Part III: Navigation in Special Contexts
Chapter 11. Navigation and Search
Section 11.1. NAVIGATION PRIOR TO SEARCH
Section 11.2. NAVIGATION AFTER SEARCH
Section 11.3. FACETED BROWSE
Section 11.4. SUMMARY
Section 11.5. QUESTIONS
Section 11.6. FURTHER READING
Chapter 12. Navigation and Social Tagging Systems
Section 12.1. TAGGING
Section 12.2. NAVIGATING SOCIAL CLASSIFICATIONS
Section 12.3. SUMMARY
Section 12.4. QUESTIONS
Section 12.5. FURTHER READING
Chapter 13. Navigation and Rich Web Applications
Section 13.1. RICH WEB APPLICATIONS
Section 13.2. NAVIGATING RICH WEB APPLICATIONS
Section 13.3. DESIGNING RICH WEB APPLICATIONS
Section 13.4. SUMMARY
Section 13.5. QUESTIONS
Section 13.6. FURTHER READING
References
ORGANIZATION OF THIS BOOK
There are three larger parts to this book. It begins with a tour of aspects and elements of web navigation, introduces a framework for navigation design, and finally explores some special topics of navigation.
Part I
Designing Web Navigation begins by introducing two basic areas of navigation design that you should understand before starting a project: human information behavior and web navigation elements. How do we navigate on the Web? How do we find information in general? Understanding these broader concerns can help you arrive at an appropriate solution for your navigation system. Also keep in mind that for any one problem, there may be a large palette of navigation mechanisms and navigation types that solve it. You need to be familiar with the tools of craft. Part I provides an overview of web navigation, navigation behavior, and some of the building blocks needed to create effective systems.
Part II
Every completed web project has a process because there is an outcome. Something had to have happened to get to the final result. The question is if the process was planned or unplanned, implicit or explicit, organized or chaotic. Part II offers a systematic framework for navigation design. Describing the process in terms of phases helps us focus on individual aspects and learn from the method more easily. In practice, however, the steps you'll take to create navigation probably won't be linear, but instead, you'll move back to previous steps or skip ahead. The phases presented here represent modes of thinking, not blocks of time on a project plan. Overall, web navigation design is about moving from an abstract concept to a concrete solution.
Part III
Navigation underlies most aspects of web design. As new design techniques, new types of web services, and new technologies emerge, good navigation design continues to play a critical role in their success. The last part of this book surveys several different contexts for web navigation: integrating navigation and search, creating effective navigation systems for social classifications and tagging services, and developing navigation with rich web applications.