Mobile Information Architecture

1
Mobile Information Architecture
2
Mobile Differences

• Location?
• Everywhere
• Household
• Automobile
• Fieldwork
• Officework
• Purpose?
• Everything (Integrated Devices)
• Single Task (Appliances)
• Interface?
• Personalized
• Simplified
• Audio In
• Audio Out
• Modal
• Contextual

3
Mobile You

• Intimacy
• Not just My Yahoo
• My Device
• Faceplates
• Ringtones
• Button Overlays
• Ubiquity
• Proximity
• Interoperability
• Connectivity (always on)
• Content
• Dynamic Streaming Data
• Email Voicemail Pic mail
• Web Data
• Synchronization
• New Designs and Functions

4
Mobile Functionality

• Bandwidth
• Wireless
• Security
• Financial Mgmt
• Cryptography
• Ubiquitous Computing
• Privacy
• Cultural
• Adoption
• Revolution
• Locating and Relocating Information
• Directions, Shopping Lists, Contacts

5
Mobile Tasks

• Task-specific use that is very modal
• How does this change design?
• Navigate Locate Recognize Act
• Human Short Term Memory 7/-2
• Unfamiliar Tasks Cognitive Overload
• Minimal Graphics ( Resolution) Affects Landmark
  Use
• More Skimming, Information Lost
• Task Focus Equalized Among Tasks
• Leverage Existing Mental Models
• Hierarchical Models
• The Right Schema (Appearance)

6
Mobile Design vs IA

• Most Guidelines are for Interfaces, Not
  Information (Architecture)
• Not Just Less Information
• Not Only Lists, but Structures
• IA May Help More Than UI
• Re-Think Web Design Ideas and Guidelines
• Web Browsing vs. Strategic Information Seeking
• Task-Specific
• Look-Ups (Reminding and Refreshing)
• Not Exhaustive Searches (Learning)
• Answer Clearly Articulated Questions
• On-Line Comprehension
• Even Less on Handhelds (Note Cards?)
• Context Concise Information
• Order of Problems Tasks
• Relative Semantic Representations of Information

7
Mobile IA

• From Crumlish (Yahoo!)
• Mobile is coming of age affordability
• Should work with your existing IA
• Not the desktop anymore
• The Mobile Web is Everywhere (Everyware?)
• Asking questions with concrete goals
• Less browsing, more personal context
• Interface changes
• Vertical lists (with key equivalents)
• Do we mean Web sites with mobile versions?
• Or altogether new designs?
• New IA Content Management challenges
• Google Mobile
• Amazon Mobile

8
Mobile IA Redesigns

• Smaller lists
• Limit categories to 5
• Number key access
• Make thinks links as often as possible
• Understand SmartPhone limits
• Use (w)CSS effectively
• Reduce content on each page
• No sidebars
• First try - a mobile sub-set site?

9
Mobile Web Strategies

• How do you add value to lives with mobile
  technology?
• Design for small PCs with functionality rather
  than phones
• Why should it be mobile?
• iSchool
• Google Maps
• Alamo Drafthouse
• Paper prototyping user evaluations on the spot
• Usability testing for mobiles is still new
• Lab testing often difficult past initial designs
• IA Deliverables
• Simple Site Maps
• Heavy user scenarios
• Icon graphics design more important (if any)

10
Questions for Mobile IA work

• How do you navigate with much less space?
• Do all concepts/units of information have the
  same weight in all situations?
• What does Web standard markup mean for mobiles?
• Try it out 1-800-GOOG-411

11
IA Re-Design

• How would you re-design a site for Mobile?
• iSchool Web page
• Alamo Drafthouse
• Google Maps
• Sketch a design on a full page
• Iterate and sketch on an index card
• Repeat
• Have a user scenario in mind

12
IA Mobile for the Future

• Smart Mobs Howard Rheingold
• Contextual Computing
• Invisible Computer Don Norman
• Good Old-Fashioned Future - Bruce Sterling
• Industrial Design
• DoCoMo
• Apple Knowledge Navigator
• HP Cooltown
• IBM Pervasive Computing
• UbiComp
• IEEE Spectrum
• Japan