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.