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myUMich Service Architecture. Janus Project Brown Bag 1 June 2000. Overview. Introductions Institutional messages & business goals Linda Place User requirements study Judy Dean Portal benchmark study John Cady Service/information architecture John Cady & BJ Streu.
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myUMich Service Architecture Janus Project Brown Bag 1 June 2000
Overview • Introductions • Institutional messages & business goals • Linda Place • User requirements study • Judy Dean • Portal benchmark study • John Cady • Service/information architecture • John Cady & BJ Streu myUMich Service Architecture
Institutional Messages • Suspension of Belief • “Publicness” • Faculty Autonomy • Transparent Administration • Making Our History Visible myUMich Service Architecture
Principle of Suspension of Belief • Creation of an environment that • Enables and supports intellectual and artistic creativity and exploration of alternative world views • Encourages risking identity loss and discourages rigid perspectives • Encourages exploration of complexity • Fosters compromise and accommodation across divergent viewpoints myUMich Service Architecture
Principle of “Publicness” • Local community minded • Commitment to eliminating socio-economic barriers to education • Enabling an education that interacts with as many aspects of American life as possible myUMich Service Architecture
Principle of Faculty Autonomy • Decentralization of decision making with respect to teaching and research • Enable taking of personal responsibility • Encourage personal engagement with work myUMich Service Architecture
Principle of Transparent Admin • Keep bureaucracy invisible to faculty and students • Enable creativity and exploration to happen without being obviously present • Do not focus on production of goods and services but on enabling of academic processes myUMich Service Architecture
Principle of Visible History • Take community member accomplishments seriously by keeping them visible myUMich Service Architecture
Business Goals • Improved recruitment and retention • Brand enhancement (national recognition) • Development of lifelong relationships myUMich Service Architecture
First Target Audience • Undergraduate students • Potential students myUMich Service Architecture
User Requirements Overview • Role and task modeling • Student interactions and user testing • “Best practices” research and benchmarking myUMich Service Architecture
Portal Benchmark Study • Goal: see how to best handle portal structure • Studied: • Top 10 Internet portals (as ranked by Traffick.com) • Two school-specific portals with guest views • Looked at college student portals; none worth study • Focus: organization, navigation, and labeling myUMich Service Architecture
Positive Findings • Found some strong examples to emulate • Solid confirmation of the utility of the “containers” approach as the primary model of organization myUMich Service Architecture
Also, great insights into customization options: Add/remove modules Customize within a module Move content within columns Etc. And into creating the customization process: Strategies for easily moving content up or down in a column How to give user feedback about changes Positive Findings, part 2 myUMich Service Architecture
Pitfalls • However, we also discovered some pitfalls • Some sites supplemented container navigation with lists of menu items, navigation bars, etc. • This caused a variety of problems: • Pitfall #1: menu sprawl myUMich Service Architecture
Pitfalls • #2: multiple navigation bars myUMich Service Architecture
Pitfalls (continued) • #3: several levels of menus myUMich Service Architecture
Pitfalls • #4: partial inclusion of options myUMich Service Architecture
Pitfalls • #5: Duplication or near-duplication of links myUMich Service Architecture
Benchmark Summary • Some good ideas • Some lessons • A state-of-the-art architecture is within our reach myUMich Service Architecture
Proposed Organizational Structure • In a static Web site: design architecture + content simultaneously • In interactive, fluid portal environment: design shell first, then architectures of services myUMich Service Architecture
Satisfy those fans of one all-in-one page and those who prefer several simpler pages Avoid the menu pitfalls we found in other portals Build a system that can accommodate services we haven't even thought of yet Keep things simple and efficient for the user Design Considerations How to: myUMich Service Architecture
An Answer • Aha! Yahoo! • Not a graphically pleasing site, but a very functional one • Yahoo! architecture • Begin with single all-in-one page • Can add pages, choose content, and name them myUMich Service Architecture
Advantages of Yahoo! Approach • Gives user control over the way s/he defines “simple” • Relieves us of need to categorize menu items • Relieves us of potential menu item politics • User presented with only as much complexity as needed myUMich Service Architecture
Using the Yahoo! Method • This model gives us the greatest flexibility and modularity of all the systems we’ve seen • It has been tested and is proving popular • Yahoo! is by far the portal leader(see handouts) • Our architecture will be more sophisticated and flexible than either MyUW or MyUCLA (and the latter has been in use since 1997) myUMich Service Architecture
Other Structural Notes • Keep navigation to a minimum and prominent • Build an intuitive and easy customization process • Educate users re: customization benefits/ease • Take care in designing default page; most users not expected to customize, at least at first myUMich Service Architecture
Contributing to Student Input Contact Linda Place lmp@umich.edu 615-5820
