There are many different factors that contribute to web design. There are coders and designers who deal more with the look and layout of a site, and then there is information architects who deal with navigation of the site. Both play vital role in a websites development. The article “Information Architecture” by Allan Hoffman goes into details about the importance of information architects or IA’s as they are otherwise known. According to the article, “The Information Architecture Institute, a professional organization formerly known as The Asilomar Institute for Information Architecture, defines teh field as “the structural design of shared information environments.” It goes to talk about the duties of Information Architects when it states they “often work closely with software and web teams but typically focus on navigation schemes and usability rather than pure design or hard-core coding.”
I found this article to be very interesting, because when analyzing a webpage, I never really thought about who was behind the creation of websites until I started coding sites myself. Coders, programmers, architects, and designers all play a major role in building a site. IAs have a very important job as well because they have to make sure all the content within the pages flows and is properly linked. Sites have to be user-friendly and easy to navigate. All sites would be purposely if users could not navigate no matter how pretty the layout or how important the information is. Navigation and usability is key when dealing with web design.
As I began to code sites, I soon came to realize how important all the other departments contributions to the development of a site was. From this article, it seems as though IA’s have never really been considered when it came to the field, but are now emerging and becoming more known. I find this to be a great thing because each field gets to learn and feed off of one another. In more ways then one, all of the fields are related and work hand-in hand with one another. There are many different factors that contribute to web design, and as seen in this article there will be many more that emerge.
