Publisher:
O'Reilly
Authors: Louis Rosenfeld and Peter Morville
ISBN: 1565922824
Publication Date: February 1998
Retail Price: $24.95
In a world crowded with books on designing cool Web sites, finally someone has written a book that simply -- and clearly -- explains how to build a Web site that people can find information in.
What a concept.
I must confess that since I started living on the Web, most of the actual paper-based books I've read have been old
Quiller novels.
But, traveling to an upcoming interview with one of the authors of
Information Architecture for the World Wide Web,
I thought it was only fair that I at least leaf through it on the airplane.
I couldn't put it down.
Perhaps it's because my job entails running a number of Web sites, but the dozens of facts, war stories, and user studies related in this book really struck home. By the time I got off the plane, I had folded down the corners of half a dozen pages, had a list of redesign ideas, and had even come up with a product idea or two. That's the kind of book this is.
Here's a list of the chapters:
- What Makes a Web Site Work
- Introduction to Information Architecture
- Organizing Information
- Designing Navigation Systems
- Labeling Systems
- Searching Systems
- Research
- Conceptual Design
- Production and Operations
- Information Architecture in Action
Information Architecture for the World Wide Web
isn't a fancy "designer" book, either, but it's well-illustrated. It's also refreshingly easy to read, especially considering that it's supposed to be a "serious" book. Here's one of my favorite lines, which also gives you an idea of where the authors are coming from:
"This is not the typical O'Reilly animal book that tells you how to build a Unix firewall machine from a box of toothpicks and an old coffee maker".
This book, like so many of O'Reilly's others, is destined to be an instant classic. As a further idea of its stature, the foreword was written by Jakob Neilsen, arguably the world's top guru of Web site usability.
If you run a Web site of any size over two dozen pages, you will definitely be happy that you bought this book! And get a copy for your boss too.
-- David Fiedler
Listen to Our Interview with Peter Morville
Live from Spring Internet World 1998
Selections include:
|
Dr. Website®
