Academic fields and their relationships

As previously mentioned, I am currently tasked with determining the controlled vocabulary for:

• category
• field
• campus
• year

Campus and year are fairly simple. I feel like I have a pretty good handle on category, although that list might undergo minor changes. That leaves academic fields.

I had a rough list based on the fields of the 50 or so projects in my sample (some staff members shared projects, visualizations, and media that they work with; I have used those items to develop the list of keywords and filters that I have previously mentioned). 

Part of the trick with this project is making sure the controlled vocabulary can grow as needed. Currently, there are a few academic groups that the AVL has regularly collaborated with, which creates a bias toward those fields. Bearing that in mind, I started by creating a list of all the schools and departments on the eight IU campuses. 

There are a lot of fields represented by all the departments and schools.

Next step: I sorted all those departments and schools into broad categories: humanities, social sciences, natural sciences. There is a lot of overlap between humanities and social sciences. And natural sciences leaves out some important areas. Changing natural sciences to formal sciences (mathematics), physical sciences (chemistry, physics, earth sciences, space science), life sciences (biology), applied sciences (engineering, computer science, medicine, nursing, etc) is more useful, but also a lot of board categories, some of which really only have one field (yes, there are fields like microbiology, but the goal of this is to narrow the long list).

So I have settled on broad categories of humanities, social sciences, and sciences, with some fields further split out. While the list isn't quite done, I'm pretty happy with where it is right now. There will be some tweaking, but I feel like I have a good base. 

Part of creating this controlled vocabulary is testing it against my sample. I need test cases to demonstrate how the controlled vocabulary would be used. And there are a couple of items in my sample that don't fit any of those fields.

Now, athletics aren't necessarily an academic field, but sports are a big deal at a university. A couple of the visualizations involve Olympic or World Cup data on the Science on a Sphere. The athletic department might potentially be a client (the AVL has worked with the athletic department in the past). So I am considering adding athletics as a field. It's something to discuss with my supervisor, at any rate.

And that's where I am. Refining my lists, waiting to talk to my supervisor. 

Persuasion

Monday I presented my project progress to a small group, including the manager and director. One of the things I have been working on, as you know if you've been reading this blog, is coming up with controlled vocabulary terms for filters.

Filters, especially drop-down menus, get a bad rap from some folks, but they are actually very useful in helping website visitors to find what they are looking for. Without filters or some way to narrow down selections, a large collection of items, which this site will be, can be overwhelming. Yes, it's good to allow free text search, especially if someone knows exactly what they are looking for. But not everyone does.

Controlled vocabulary and filters aid browsing and serendipity.

In the presentation, I ran into some pushback on the idea of having a controlled vocabulary and having filters, because "I hate drop-down menus." So what was supposed to be an hour-long meeting where I presented my progress and we set down next steps became an hour and a half meeting wherein several of us spent about 45 minutes persuading the director that a controlled vocabulary was both necessary and useful.

We did convince him. He did agree that we could implement a controlled vocabulary in a way that would not be onerous and would make things work better.

We also agreed on the categories for filters and/or keywords:

• Category - What is the thing? The controlled vocabulary for this is pretty solid and might need minor tweaking.
• Field - What academic field(s) does the project apply to? I have a start on this controlled vocabulary, but there are a lot of possible fields, plus I want to limit the list to about 20, if possible.
• Campus - Since the AVL spans all 8 IU campuses, a project might be initiated at a particular campus. Controlled vocabulary for this will be fairly simple: we just have to decide on the format (e.g., IUB or Bloomington).
• Year - I think this will be a simple 4-digit year.
• Name - This would be a tricky one for a controlled vocabulary (it could be done). The agreement we came to was that this field would be free-text for data entry, which may or may not be the best. Hopefully we can set a standard (first name first or last name first? initials or full names?).

My task for the rest of this week is to nail down the controlled vocabulary. I'm also supposed to work up some test cases to demonstrate how the controlled vocabulary will aid someone in finding an item.

The original schedule had me designing, which I had started, but they are less concerned with following that schedule than with getting this part worked out since this is where efforts at organization have failed in the past.

Take-away: Sometimes you have to step back and slow down to do things right. Rushing would get something done, but it might not be as long-lasting. Also, sometimes you have to stand up for what will be a better choice. 

Making decisions

At the beginning of last week, I had rethought my designs and added a fourth possibility. And by Thursday I realized that four designs was just too much. I was hired to work on this project, to assess the information needs and design the web portal. I'm supposed to make recommendations.

So I have reduced my design choices to two: 

1. a very simple design with a search box and one or two filters right off the bat and 
2. that design modified to include "easy buttons" at the top with quick links right to some of the project types. 

I like the first design for its simplicity, plus I think it will last longer. New projects and assets can be added in either design, but the "easy buttons" are something that would need to be addressed as priorities change. They are a big, bold way of showing what the top initiatives are so they would need to match that. And I have a feeling it would be more likely the number would grow rather than shrink, cluttering things up.

Priorities can be reflected in the filters, with the way the filters are prioritized and organized. And yes, the filters might need to be adjusted over time, but they are in both designs. I think they are less of an issue for future-proofing the site than the "easy buttons". (Also, the filters kind of do what the "easy buttons" are designed to do. Granted, there are times and places in web design to highlight something that might be buried in a menu, thus duplicating it, but this doesn't feel like something that needs to be done here.)

Monday I will present my progress on the project. Really thinking about what I need to say is what really helped me streamline my ideas down to two. Honestly, the major difference between option 2 and the two I removed was the placement of the filters. It's my job to make the call on where the filters should be, following best practices and design recommendations. And that's why I dumped those two options.

I have also been refining the main filter. I think I have a very useful list of twelve items for the filter that will cover a large majority of projects, including the areas of focus. Of course, the list is open for input at the meeting Monday, since I might be missing something the director or manager wants to emphasize. I may have also chosen a term that needs to be discussed. 

From this mess to 12 main terms.

One of the people I interviewed for the project was someone who might actually need to use the site to find some projects but is not an expert, not an insider. Her feedback on some of the terms was very useful. So, while some of the filter terms I chose may not be the most precise or correct, they are a broader term that will be more understandable to non-experts. As an example, stereoscopic 3D is a specific type of 3D, but the broader term 3D is better understood by non-experts.

There is a second filter I have been working with, which I really thought would be useful when I started. The longer I work on the project, the more I wonder if it will just clutter things up and not be helpful. So, I will present that filter but recommend that we consider not using it. (I'm open to adding a different filter if there is one that I have missed that would be useful.)

Finally, while I will need assistance from staff to gather all the assets for the website, I started a spreadsheet of the ones I have looked at so far (the ones that formed the basis for the keyword list I have been winnowing down). It will need some experts to check the metadata I have started collecting, but I thought it would be a good idea to have something to start with.

Take-away from this week: I'm being paid to make some decisions and recommendations; if the manager and director wanted to make all these decisions, they would be doing the work. I need to be confident in my choices, but I also need to be open to feedback and be ready to adapt. 

Assessing and reassessing

Last week I made 3 rough wireframes to show a few basic ideas for the AVL Showcase website. 

Then I had a weekend to think. And I thought about the idea that the director keeps referring to as his idea for the site. 

So Monday I went back to the beginning and really looked at that example and how the search and filtering work. I took a second look at some examples I had gathered of sorting and filtering. I really spent some time assessing the pros and cons of the differences in the sites and wrote up a brief to explain what I liked and didn't like about each option as it relates to this project. 

I also added a fourth rough wireframe based on that original site, something I hadn't really thought about before in the design.

A 4th design for the homepage

We have a meeting scheduled for next Monday where I will present what I have so far, and decisions can be made so I can move forward. I don't want to spend time wireframing further pages until we establish which of the 4 versions is the most suited. There are pros and cons to each, which I will need to talk about when we meet. 

Once that is settled, we need to prioritize the keywords and their categories, deciding which are going to be used in the filters because I will need those filters for the wireframing. 

Waiting to get feedback

This week involved a lot of looking at lists of keywords, arranging and rearranging them to try to make meaningful sense of all the possibilities. I spoke to a non-team member who might be the type of user this web portal will be designed for. Her feedback on how she would search for projects was very helpful, especially in terms of the labels for the main categories.

I also made some very rough wireframes of the idea I'm currently working with. And now I'm at a point where I really need some feedback.

I have 3 basic layout ideas, trying to balance "easy" buttons with the vast array of descriptors that will be used. Making a decision on which of those ideas to work from will allow me to start wireframing in earnest.

Version 3 of the basic layout

The second thing I need feedback on is my organization of the keywords and which should be used in filters and which just left to search terms. Or, do we leave all of them in a big tag cloud? Maybe not the best idea, but possibly closer to what is desired.

I also need to start gathering the assets that will go into the website. We need to organize the items, give them appropriate keywords, create a database or spreadsheet, write descriptions, etc.

So, I am waiting for my supervisor to look over what I have done and then we need to schedule a meeting with the manager and director so those decisions can be made.

And that's the take away this week: sometimes people are busy and you have to move to another part of the project you can do while you wait.

Looking to the future

Monday morning I attended my first group meeting with the AVL. The meeting was about looking at achievements of the past and looking forward into the future. After 20 years, the group has accomplished a lot but there are always new initiatives and new goals; the cutting edge moves fast. What was advanced visualization 5, 10, or 20 years ago isn't anymore. Technology changes fast and a group like the AVL can't rest of its laurels.

Seeing a glimpse of priorities for the next 5 years was helpful for me because it gave me an idea of some of the top level categories, some of the priorities, I need to use in my design. The site I am designing isn't about the initiatives but about the projects, so the trick now is to separate initiatives from projects.

Looking into the future... or a head-mounted VR display.

It was interesting to see how different folks in the group responded to changes that are happening, who was pushing back, who was on board. In my working life I've been in several jobs where the company has undergone major upheaval, much more than these changes in focus and funding. Changes at one company I worked at were so poorly received by staff that we were all required to read "Who Moved My Cheese" by Spencer Johnson and attend weekly meetings to discuss it.

It's always enlightening to watch the responses to change.

There are folks who push back and resist, who are comfortable with the way things are. There are folks who accept, maybe asking questions, who realize that moving forward involves change. There are folks who embrace change and see it as exciting, a chance to mold the future.

One of the initiatives moving forward that was mentioned at the meeting was my IA project to create a web portal for many of the AVL's projects. Everyone seems to be on board with the project, recognizing that there is value in having an online portfolio of the work the group has done.

Search vs filter

One of the big decisions I am working on for this project is deciding which keywords are for filtering and which will just be for search. 

My preliminary list has over 130 descriptors. That's way too many to work well for filters, but filtering is part of the essential plan for the site. 

So, I need to sort the keywords into groups, decide which are important to use in filters, which might be extraneous, and which we should still use in the metadata for searchability. I'm narrowing down which I think need to be used in the filters with help from staff via card sorting.

I also have started sketching a very preliminary wireframe, those famed boxes and arrows, to explain how I'm thinking about the design. It's helpful to have this when I explain what I want done with my index cards.

Preliminary pencil sketch

What I'm finding as I do this is that it's actually quite hard to group some of these concepts and determining which are important isn't always clearcut. 

In my first pass through the index cards, I created a group I called "purpose" which contained concepts related to how a type of technology might be used. Included in this group were keywords like "research", "preservation", and "virtual tour". 

Now, those might be terms that are useful as filters or not. They may be better left to search. But a conversation my supervisor had today with a potential client highlights how having those types of keywords could be valuable. The people she was talking to wanted to be able to create virtual tours of the library and the different spaces there. Since a virtual tour could be done in VR, panographic images, 360 images, and maybe other options, being able to search and find previous projects that are virtual tours would be helpful. 

So, I'm still sorting and resorting keywords, gathering data, and really thinking about how they might be used. Hopefully I'll have a clear idea by the end of next week so I can move on to designing the interface.

Week four: Descriptors and keywords

My focus this week is descriptors. Descriptors are the words used to describe the various assets, the words that may eventually become keywords. 

I say may because, for this project, not all of the descriptors might be useful as keywords. Some will be in the text description while others will be used as metadata on the items. It's really the ones that end up in metadata that are of particular concern. 

Deciding which facets are important to be able to search on is part of what my job is on this project. So, while there are many ways to describe the digital assets, not all are useful for searching, sorting, or filtering. It's my job, along with my supervisor and the manager, to understand which are useful and which aren't. 

Currently, I have 139 descriptors. I'm still conducting interviews so the list may grow, although each interview elicits fewer new terms. I have started standardizing some of the vocabulary (the original list of terms was over 150). One task I need to start is categorizing the descriptors. With such a long list, they need to be organized into facets or they will be too unwieldy to use. 

Tried and true

My idea is to use card sorting, which is often used to organize the hierarchy of a website, to sort the descriptors into facets. Using knowledgeable staff to help determine what category different descriptors belong to and find good labels will be much more productive than me trying to figure out whether a term should be, say, "technology" or "tool". I'm a fan of using physical cards, especially with a small group of people doing the sort, although there are online tools I could use. Looking into those tools to see if there is one that would suit my needs is on my plan for Thursday.

In classes, I've done some card sorting (in Z515, Information Architecture) and I've created a faceted vocabulary (in Z503, Representation and Organization), but those were mostly theoretical applications or with familiar domains. Actually taking a bunch of information from an unfamiliar domain and organizing it is a little intimidating but also a good test. And, I don't have to do it all myself. That's the point of having the staff participate in a card sort: they will help guide the final organization. They and clients (users) will need to understand the organization and structure, so it needs to be based in already established organization.