SIGIA-L Mail Archives: RE: SIGIA-L: quick request: page layouts
RE: SIGIA-L: quick request: page layouts
From: Ashk, Adamya (Adamya.Ashk_at_Staples.com)
Date: Thu Apr 04 2002 - 09:57:58 EST
Well it's interesting that you bring this up. I have been clicking through
the BBC site a bit and it is organized as a collection of subsites. So
http://www.bbc.co.uk/health is a self contained piece which lives under the
overall umbrella of the BBCi site.
The categories page also has a heading (alphabetically placed) on health
(linked) and the links below point to sections under the health sub-site.
So, I guess, in choosing these links, the attempt is more to represent the
content of the subsite through themes and important sections, rather than
any organizational principle. This provides more freedom in managing the
content of the subsite separately from the content of the BBC portal (BBCi),
while still linking everything together in a comprehensible whole.
That said, how we organize many links on a page should be driven by the
purpose of the page (principle based). But it is important to tweak that
organization for user needs and demands. This pre-supposes efficient
tracking and reporting but that is another discussion... :)
I hope this answers your question in some round about way...
-----Original Message-----
From: Louise [mailto:gruenberg.louise_at_attbi.com]
Sent: Wednesday, April 03, 2002 10:02 PM
To: Ashk, Adamya
Cc: sigia-l_at_asis.org
Subject: Re: SIGIA-L: quick request: page layouts
Despite the hypertextural differences, the Web still has some similarities
to
document genres and owes some of its organizational principles to library
science. This site reminds me of a print directory. Notice the
alphabetization
of the broad classifications. These cues, along with the bold text headings,
background color change (provides horizontal striping effect which aids the
eye
in scanning across) and columnar format all help users quickly scan the
seemingly dense amount of text to quickly zero in on what is of interest to
them.
On the other hand, the links below the broad categories may or may not be in
alphabetical order. Some appear to be listed in order of popularity (is this
guesswork or from server logs?)
Just curious. What organizational principles have you noticed at work on
pages
like this, where there is a dense ratio of links to whitespace?
Louise
"Ashk, Adamya" wrote:
> I like www.bbc.co.uk and more specifically
http://www.bbc.co.uk/categories/.
> (this is almost an index). The BBC site resizes well and there is lower
> density of "stuff" above the fold in lower resolutions (800x600). As the
> window sizes go up, however, you get much more information (links to).
> The nature of information on a page can also make quite a difference for
the
> link density and subsequently the "usefulness".
>
> Adamya
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Christina Wodtke [mailto:cwodtke_at_eleganthack.com]
> Sent: Monday, April 01, 2002 2:12 PM
> To: sigia-l_at_asis.org
> Subject: SIGIA-L: quick request: page layouts
>
> hey all,
>
> I'm looking for examples of pages with tons of stuff on them that are
> actually we organized and sensible, and pages that have very little on
them
> and aren't usable. if people are curious, I can summarize. if people are
> interested in debate, I'm working on debunking/redefining/understanding
the
> "pages have too much stuff on them are unusable"
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