Mantex

Tutorials, Study Guides & More

  • HOME
  • REVIEWS
  • TUTORIALS
  • HOW-TO
  • CONTACT
>> Home / Archives for Data management

Dynamics in Document Design

July 17, 2009 by Roy Johnson

information layout and management for professionals

Karen Schriver’s Dynamics in Document Design is another strong entry in the Wiley series of books about writing in the marketplace. Schriver does not intend yet another ‘how to’ book for beginning document designers. Such books are plentiful. She assumes her audience is acquainted with the fundamentals of document design and wants more information about the complexities and subtleties of document design. In this area – and many others – Schriver succeeds admirably.

Dynamics in Document DesignSchriver’s book is so rich in insight, information, and innovation that no review will do it justice. One of the book’s many virtues is its presentation of heuristics for making decisions about typography and page-layout grids. A heuristic, as Schriver explains, “is a way of thinking systematically about the key features of a problem.” Schriver’s heuristic for grids includes taking an inventory of all the text elements (photographs, descriptions, captions, etc.) in the document, organizing these text elements into rhetorical clusters, measuring the actual print or display area, dividing the print or display area into columns and rows, considering exceptions and deviations, trying out some optional spatial arrays for the document, and applying the grid to longer sections of the document to see how it works. For someone who has to design a longer document or complicated web site, Schriver’s heuristics are very useful.

Schriver has not neglected design issues on the Internet. Her 18-page discussion of a student’s case study of the effectiveness of a web site is worth the entire price of the book. As a practitioner of feedback-driven audience analysis, Schriver had taught the student, Daphne van der Vlist of Holland, procedures for studying user responses to document design. Van der Vlist studied the reactions of seven users to the Virtual Tourist web site.

As happens often in Schriver’s book, real users have rich and informative critiques of real documents. In her study, van der Vlist found that users had trouble with incomplete and illogically clustered headings, information that violated users’ expectations, underdeveloped information, poorly laid out lists, and pictures that narrowed content inappropriately. To aid her readers in understanding the users’ problems, Schriver used a four-page spread of eight screens from the web site, with user annotations in the margins surrounding the centered screen representations. Schriver’s analysis and graphic presentation of her student’s case is exceptionally informative and effective. People designing web sites should read this section.

Another strong section of her book describes one of her own projects-
evaluating government-created drug education brochures aimed at teenagers. Using feedback-driven audience analysis, Schriver and her collaborators gathered 297 students ranging from 11 to 21 years old and asked them to respond to the text and graphics in the brochures that they provided. The students’ responses were very sophisticated and revealing. Schriver presents the responses to several brochures by using the format mentioned earlier. She reproduces the brochure in the center of a single page or a two-page spread and surrounds it with student responses in the margin. She draws lines to connect student responses to specific passages and graphics.

The student responses are very constructive and sophisticated. One complained that a brochure was cliched and suggested that a more effective approach would be to present stories about how drug users died or destroyed their lives. Another student complained of the long paragraphs and suggested a list, which other young people would be more inclined to read. Another said the impact of a brochure would be improved if the authors “use pictures of a dead guy.” The students were especially fond of realism. Many of them disliked the line drawings and preferred photographs of actual drug users suffering the effects of drug abuse.

Schriver also discussed the constraints that the government writers and graphic designers operated under when they developed the drug education literature. Many were reluctant to talk about what they did. Bureaucracy and politics stifle the effectiveness of documents and of open communication between researcher/designers like Schriver and her subjects. A quotation from one person eloquently revealed the stress that some government writers and designers felt:

That brochure is not attributable to anyone. We receive lots of assignments, that was just one of them. We can’t say who wrote it. There are so many hands in the process. And we can’t say that what was printed was what anyone in this office wrote. We have to go now.

Schriver offers an important innovation to document design teachers – her protocol-aided audience-modeling method (PAM), which allows document designers to better anticipate problems that users have with documents. PAM has two steps: (1) The student reads a sample document and lists the problems she thinks the intended audience will have with the text and graphics. (2) The student reads a transcript of a think-aloud protocol created by one of the intended users of the same document. A think-aloud protocol has a user think aloud about any difficulties she or he encounters while reading a document (form, instruction, etc.). In her research, Schriver has found that students using PAM were 62% more accurate than a control group in predicting readers’ problems. PAM, in short, is much better than such traditional methods as audience heuristics, peer-group critiquing, role-playing, and purpose oriented audience analysis.

Yet another valuable innovation is Schriver’s timeline of document design from 1900 to 1995. She devotes forty-four pages to tracing the evolution of five design contexts: education and practice in writing and rhetoric; professional developments in writing and graphic design; education and practice in graphic design; science, technology, and the environment; and society and consumerism. On twenty-two sets of facing pages, Schriver has columns devoted to each of the aforementioned contexts in a given decade of the twentieth century.

The evolution of education and practice in writing and rhetoric is fascinating by itself. Schriver begins in 1900 with the instructional emphasis on usage, grammar, and mechanics. “Students are expected to adapt their texts for an audience and to find an original thesis, but they are not taught explicit ways to do so.” In 1904, one of the first technical writing courses in the twentieth century was taught at Tufts College. In 1939, “teaching technical writing or composition at the college level is considered ‘professional suicide’.” In the 1950’s, college instructors finally begin to pay some attention to audience analysis and the relations between writers and readers. In 1955 and later, technical communication courses begin to show interest in teaching graphics. In the 1970’s, some technical communications professors finally begin to get tenure for work in their specialties. In 1994, academics and industry experts express concern that literature professors have too much say in tenuring and promoting writing, rhetoric, and technical communication faculty.

Again, this review cannot pretend to do justice to the many virtues and innovations in Karen Schriver’s excellent book. Even though she aims her book more at experienced document designers and information architects, beginners and students can also profit from reading it. If you design documents for paper or electronic publication, buy this book. You will not be disappointed.

© Patrick Moore 1997

Dynamics in Document Design   Buy the book at Amazon UK

Dynamics in Document Design   Buy the book at Amazon US


Karen A. Schriver, Dynamics in Document Design, NewYork/London: John Wiley & Sons: 1997, pp.560, ISBN: 0471306363


More on information design
More on design
More on media
More on web design


Filed Under: Information Design Tagged With: Data management, Data visualization, Document design, Information design

Information Architecture

July 25, 2009 by Roy Johnson

the basic principles of organising information

Books on Information Architecture are coming thick and fast at the moment. Christina Wodtke’s approach will appeal to anyone who wants to learn the main principles, without having to wade through lots of abstractions and jargon. Her written style is very much influenced by web-based writing. She is concise, straight to the point, and entertaining. She starts out by looking at the basics of navigation, screen layout, subject categorising, usability, and liquid pages.

Information ArchitectureAll the time, she keeps the site visitor in mind. It’s a friendly, practical approach, and she illustrates all her points with plenty of screenshots. The main novelty she has to offer is to puncture some of the common suppositions about web design. For instance she argues quite persuasively against a one-size-fits-all approach:

Beware of gurus peddling simple answers. Instead, seek better tools to help you think up better solutions. Think first. Design second.

As is common with good advice, a lot of it seems very obvious when spelled out – but it is useful to be reminded that on the homepage of a site you should ‘show people the range of your offerings’.

She also recommends ‘see also’ pages of the kind at which Amazon excel. If someone visits pages dealing in laptops and novels, there’s a good chance they will also be interested in software and magazine subscriptions.

There’s a particularly good chapter on meta-data where she explains the reason why ‘information about information’ is important. This also includes a clear account of controlled vocabularies – one of the latest issues in usability and Web promotion.

She explains the systems of what are called ‘global navigation systems’ – the links, buttons, and tabs which normally appear at the side(s) and top of every page.

The latter part of the book deals with the process of mapping out and designing a site. This is something that should be done with pencil and paper. She includes storyboarding techniques, sitemaps, content inventories, wireframes – and even illustrates how to conduct cheap, small-scale usability testing.

This is another top quality production from New Riders – who have almost cornered the market in books on this subject.

© Roy Johnson 2005

Information Architecture   Buy the book at Amazon UK

Information Architecture   Buy the book at Amazon US


Christina Wodtke, Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web, Indianapolis (IN): New Riders, 2002, pp.348, ISBN: 0735712506


More on digital media
More on information design


More on information design
More on design
More on media
More on web design


Filed Under: Information Design Tagged With: Data management, Information architecture, Information design, Web design

Information Design

June 29, 2009 by Roy Johnson

essays on the theory and practice of information design

There has recently been a great deal of debate amongst members of the design community about the status of their profession, the exact meaning of ‘information design’, and the nature of what it is they are supposed to be doing. This collection of essays is a contribution to that debate and an attempt to think about the future of information design. The first part of the book offers a number of theoretical statements, in the best of which Robert E. Horn – one of the earliest pioneers of writing about hypertext – provides a useful historical survey of designers of information.

Information DesignHe summarises his argument by claiming that there now exists a ‘visual language’ in which words, images, and shapes are combined into what he calls a ‘unified communication unit’. In another interesting essay, Romedi Passini discusses the issue of ‘wayfinding’ – which he points out is not merely a matter of signs. People navigate their passage through known and unknown terrain using markers and semiotics more subtle than pointing fingers and boards saying ‘This Way’. This essay is crying out for more illustration, which is rather surprising in a study of design.

Part two is concerned with practical applications, and offers examples as broad as tactile signage in an institution for visual disorders, graphic tools for thinking, and visual design in three dimensions. The longest and possibly most successful contribution is by C. G. Screven on signage in museums and other public places – successful because it unites theory and practice.

The third part deals with design in the field of information technology. An essay by Jim Gasperini breathes some new life into the collection with his consideration of fiction, drama, and hypertext, and there are brief excursions into fractal sculpture and multimedia.

If ‘information design’ is now a coherent discipline and an honorable profession, then it could do with asserting itself more forcibly than do some of the contributors here. [Louis Rosenfeld and Peter Morville’s Information Architecture for the World Wide Web should be compulsory reading for all of them.] However, it’s a start, and one which anybody engaged with the current debates will do well to study.

© Roy Johnson 2000

Buy the book at Amazon UK

Buy the book at Amazon US


Robert Jacobson (ed) Information Design, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1999, pp.357, ISBN 026210069X


More on information design
More on design
More on media
More on web design


Filed Under: Information Design, Theory Tagged With: Data management, Information architecture, Information design, Product design

Information Strategy in Practice

July 13, 2009 by Roy Johnson

practical information architecture – projects and policies

Elizabeth Orna is an information architect and strategist whose earlier work Practical Information Policies has become a classic text in this field. Her latest work Information Strategy in Practice is designed for a number of potential readers: students preparing to enter the information professions; working professionals; and senior managers in other specialisms who have responsibility for information activities. It’s something of a reworking of her earlier material, because the practical case studies on which it is based have been revisited and the lessons to be learned are presented here.

Information Strategy in Practice She starts out with some definitions of knowledge and information, stressing the interdependence of one on the other with a witty quote from Samuel Butler: “a chicken is merely the egg’s way of making another egg”. The organisations she investigates range from The Australian Securities and Investment Commission, to the Surrey police and the Tate Gallery. Her claims for the improvements that have been brought about by clear information policies there are well born out if you look at the Tate’s web site which has improved enormously of late, and is a model of clear structure and transparent navigation.

She recognises that although the people in organisations are supposed to work co-operatively and honestly towards a common goal, they often don’t. Information is sometimes not shared. I wish she had taken this further to consider departments which work in competition with each other, withhold information, and (in government) spy on each other.

There’s a very interesting and persuasive defence of the importance of taxonomy, classification systems, labelling, metadata, and indexing. Information architecture buffs will like this.

She finishes with some practical lessons gained from ‘difficult’ projects and some very clear guidelines for avoiding the worst mistakes. It’s not as substantial a work as her earlier Practical Information Policies, but this is one which information scientists will want to add to their list of recommended reading.

© Roy Johnson 2005

Information Strategy   Buy the book at Amazon UK
Information Strategy   Buy the book at Amazon US


Elizabeth Orna, Information Strategy in Practice, London: Gower, 2004, pp.163, ISBN: 0566085798


Filed Under: Information Design Tagged With: Data management, Information design, Information strategies, Information Strategy in Practice

Making Knowledge Visible

July 13, 2009 by Roy Johnson

practical information architecture – projects and policies

Elizabeth Orna is a big hitter in the field of information architecture and design. Her previous studies – Information Strategy in Practice, Practical Information Policies, and Managing Information for Research have all been very well received. This latest study Making Knowledge Visible sets out her ideas for making information more accessible and more useful. It is based on practical research projects conducted at institutions as diverse as the Co-Operative Bank, Essex County Council, The Tate Gallery, the National Health Service, and the Inland Revenue.

Making Knowledge Visible In the first two chapters she sets out her terms and definitions, then presents an overview of her arguments. Her central idea is a distinction she makes between knowledge and information. Knowledge resides in people’s brains: it is transformed into information when they express it in some form and make it available to someone else. That second person inverts the process by absorbing the information and transforming it into personal knowledge. She uses the term ‘Information Products’ to describe the medium in which these transformations take place: these could be books, reports, data bases, or web sites.

In any organisation these information products constitute a very valuable asset, and they ought to be complete, up to date, documented, and searchable. So much should be quite obvious, but anybody who has worked in industry, commerce, or government knows that this is often not the case. Orna is quick to observe:

I gave up being surprised a long ago by how often those essential products look as if they had been designed to repel all boarders, drive users to distraction, dissuade potential customers from purchase of goods or services, and impede staff in their work.

Fortunately, she goes on to give examples of organisations who have profited from making their own IPs explicitly to themselves. Those who have taken the trouble to value their information have profited from doing so.

But she doesn’t shy away from negative examples There’s an excruciating account of trying to bring rationality and coherence to the Department of Trade and Industry which makes you feel glad you don’t work there.

A lot of the discussion of information is often abstract, but she does make the interesting point that the value of information and knowledge are unusual compared with other commodities:

  • Transactions in them among people can benefit all parties
  • They don’t wear out from use
  • Information can be used in multiple ways by many people simultaneously

Most of the ‘black museum’ cases she exposes result in financial losses inefficiency, and employee frustration; but she also includes the example of the Cambridge police mishandling of public records which resulted in the employment of Ian Huntley as a school caretaker, even though he had a police record for attempted rapes. The result was the tragic murder of two children.

She also deals with some interesting examples which come to light as a result of the Freedom of Information Act. Institutions are obliged to comply with the new requirements to make certain of their information publicly available – but how can they do so accurately unless they have a complete and up-to-date inventory of their own data?

The main lesson which emerges is very simple and quite obvious – but it is seldom implemented. That is, there needs to be an organisational overview and a coherent approach to the management of information within an organisation – and the strength of Elizabeth Orna’s approach is that she does show how it is possible.

One other feature of her work I found attractive is that she moves easily between the world of print and the web, seeing the benefits of both. For those who want to pursue these issues at a more advanced level, she also considers metadata and the Dublin Core.

Information design is a subject which spins out in all directions to include other subjects – information architecture; typography and graphic presentation; usability; web design; systems analysis; and organisational structures. One of the strong features of Orna’s work is that she takes them all into account.

All her claims are meticulously documented, and each chapter carries its own bibliography and list of relevant URLs. It’s also worth noting that the book itself is very elegantly designed by her usual collaborator Graham Stevens.

This is a book aimed at information and systems analysts and managers, web designers, communication specialists, plus teachers and students of business management. I think librarians, project managers, and business consultants would also have a lot to learn from what she has to say.

© Roy Johnson 2005

Making Knowledge Visible   Buy the book at Amazon UK

Making Knowledge Visible   Buy the book at Amazon US


Elizabeth Orna, Making Knowledge Visible, Aldershot, UK: Gower, 2005, pp.212, ISBN: 0566085631


More on information design
More on design
More on media
More on web design


Filed Under: Information Design Tagged With: Data management, HTML, Information architecture, Information design, Making Knowledge Visible

Managing Information for Research

July 13, 2009 by Roy Johnson

practical strategies for data management and research

Most people feel challenged when faced with the prospect of a research project. And why not? After all, it’s not something we do every day. The biggest problem (usually) is knowing how to cope with both the shape and the volume of information. Elizabeth Orna’s advice in Managing Information for Research is that we should concentrate on managing the process of research. She deals with the essential questions which are asked by anybody undertaking a project. What am I looking for? Why am I looking for it? How shall I set about the task? Where shall I start looking? And she answers these questions by showing practical examples and demonstrating how to both define and limit the task. Her evidence is drawn from a long and distinguished career, working in education and government.

Managing Information for ResearchWhat she is offering here are “ways of thinking about information, and practical techniques of applying the thinking that are characteristic of the disciplines known variously as ‘information science’, ‘librarianship’, ‘information management’, or ‘information studies’.” This is not how to grub around for your data, but what to do with it when you’ve got it.

She discusses for instance the simple practicalities of organising information – on cards; on A4 pages; and in indexes. [This section is crying out for extended hypertext consideration in the next edition.] She also gives an excellent example (culled from a negative experience on an MA course) of why it is important to keep a full documentary record of a research project – complete with a list of the documents required to do it. This is first-rate advice, generated from first-hand educational experience.

There’s also a section on time management, complete with guidance on estimating how long it will take to complete tasks – and what to do when you can’t realistically meet your deadlines. The purpose and readership of a project should be kept in mind so that it’s designed to meet the requirements of an intended audience – and there’s a useful checklist of questions you can apply to any work you produce.

She covers a number of possible ways of presenting your results – which leads into a consideration of what is now called ‘information architecture’. That is, thinking clearly about the way in which data is displayed in order to be useful, easily understood, and effective. This points towards the sort of work being done by Edward Tufte and the University of Reading, both of which sources I was glad to see listed in the excellent bibliographies of further reading which follow each chapter.

The latter parts of the book deal with the importance of effective page layout and good typographical design in the presentation of data. Graham Stevens points readers towards that most important feature in the principles of good design – over-riding the default settings of your word-processor. He covers the details of font choice, line length, margins, grids, word spacing, heading hierarchies, and close editing in its relation to the effective visual display of information.

The publishers have had the good sense to let him completely re-design this hugely enlarged second edition of the book. The result is tremendous improvement on the first. It’s now a production which follows the very same principles it lays down for the efficient presentation of information. It’s also an excellent piece of work which will help anyone who is prepared to learn about the most effective manner of organising and presenting information.

© Roy Johnson 2009

Information for Research   Buy the book at Amazon UK

Information for Research   Buy the book at Amazon US


Elizabeth Orna with Graham Stevens, Managing Information for Research, Buckinghamshire: Open University Press, second edition 2009, pp.271, ISBN: 0335221424


More on information design
More on design
More on media
More on study skills
More on writing skills


Filed Under: Information Design, Study skills Tagged With: Data management, Information design, Managing information, Managing Information for Research, Research, Writing skills

Practical Information Policies

July 13, 2009 by Roy Johnson

data management and information architecture

This is a study of information architecture and management – both in theory and practice. It is written with three groups of readers in mind – managers in libraries and information services; business managers and executives; and students of information science, librarianship, and information management. Elizabeth Orna starts Practical Information Policies by explaining why organizations need policies and strategies for managing information – outlining the benefits of having a policy, and the losses of not having one. She offers interesting definitions of the basic concepts she discusses, such as ‘information policy’, ‘knowledge management’, and ‘information management’.

Practical Information PoliciesWhen she moves on to look at how institutions are organized, she presents a very useful checklist of questions. These can be posed to query the efficiency of management systems. For instance, ‘What provision does the organization make for job handover and transfer of knowledge?’ These sorts of questions will be very useful to those people serious about systems analysis, just as they will strike fear into slack managers facing a quality assurance inspection.

These considerations form the basis for the next part of her study, which deals with making an information audit, then interpreting and presenting its findings. She sees individuals as repositories of skills and knowledge, and her basic argument is that they are both the prime asset of an organization and the agents for successfully managing change. The examples she discusses are drawn from real-life instances of ‘change’ such as ‘premises destroyed by bomb’ and ‘hostile takeover bid’.

The second part of the book is a series of case studies in corporate policy initiatives – including the introduction of a comprehensive IT policy at Amnesty International; the management of change at the British Library; and information strategies in the National Health Service, plus organizations as diverse as an advertising agency, the University of North London, and the Surrey Police.

Of course there are no guarantees that conducting even the most searching and intelligent audit of knowledge is going to save an organization from political or commercial doom. One of the case studies discussed here is NatWest bank, currently being swallowed up by the Royal Bank of Scotland. But as Orna finally observes, when dealing with information systems and large-scale corporate developments, ‘a degree of detachment, and a sense of humour are…useful assets.’

It’s worth saying that this is also a beautifully designed and elegantly produced book. It belongs in that rare category of publications which for book-lovers are interesting to contemplate, irrespective of their content. It follows the modern practice – which has its attractions – of placing short lists of suggested reading after each chapter, rather than in one long bibliography at the end of the book.

This is one for information professionals. The message of Practical Information Policies is that successful ‘knowledge management’ depends on knowledge in human minds, expressed in effective action, fed with appropriate information, and supported by the right blend of IT and systems. It offers readers a straightforward way of working out what their organization needs to know to survive and prosper; what information it requires to ‘feed’ its knowledge base; and how people need to interact in using knowledge and information effectively.

© Roy Johnson 2000

Practical Information Policies   Buy the book at Amazon UK

Practical Information Policies   Buy the book at Amazon US


Elizabeth Orna, Practical Information Policies, Hampshire: Gower, second edition, 1999, pp.375, ISBN: 0566076934


More on information design
More on design
More on media
More on web design


Filed Under: Information Design Tagged With: Data management, Information design, Information policies, Research

Using Statistics

July 17, 2009 by Roy Johnson

gathering, analysing, and presenting data

Many subjects such as psychology and biology have a ‘hidden’ requirement of using statistics which gives many students problems when they realise that they’ve got to tackle them as part of the course. As Gordon Rugg observes in this guide for beginners: ” Many people emerge from their first encounter with stats feeling distinctly bruised, and with a mental image of stats as a bizarre set of meaningless rituals that you have to follow because you’re told to.”

Using StatisticsWhat he’s offering is a sympathetic guide to the basic principles without terrorizing readers with a lot of abstract mathematics and complex equations. It’s intended to provide an overview of statistics, and to explain how statistics fit into the big picture of research, with particular attention to using statistics as a coherent part of research design. He brings off this intention very well by using a simple but clever device: he makes his explanations amusing, with concrete examples all the way.

So concepts such as mean, average, and standard deviation are explained using problems from everyday life, and he also explains why some of the basic statistical methods are necessary for the sake of scientific accuracy. It’s not enough to say that 50% of a sample was positive if you’ve only chosen two or three items to test, for instance.

He goes into measurement theory, showing the variety of ways in which things can be enumerated or calibrated – which is particularly useful for people designing surveys and questionnaires.

He also explains the difference between reliability and validity in statistics, using the example of ‘descriptions of Father Christmas’. These would be very reliable, because everyone will describe him in the same way; but they have zero validity, because he doesn’t actually exist.

There’s an explanation of how data can best be presented using graphs, pie-charts, and scatter diagrams – as well as the ways in which they are commonly misused.

The latter parts of the book, which deal with the presentation of knowledge – patterns, categorization, and probability theory – come almost into the realms of philosophy.

So – the first part of the book deals with measuring and presenting data accurately. This then leads to the more interesting issues of interpretation and knowing what questions can be legitimately asked when trying to assess the significance of any findings – what he calls the ‘So what?’ question.

For this, statistical tests are required. He talks you through how to choose the right type and only goes into maths and calculations when absolutely necessary. All of this is done humanely, by making his primary illustrative examples such things as a game of tiddlywinks and the height at which gorillas sleep in trees.

This is followed by even more improbable examples of limpet racing to illustrate what’s called ‘Parametric Statistics’, and he ends with some useful comments on the latest statistical software which is used for neural networks, data mining, and genetic algorithms.

I’m rather glad that my subject (literary studies) has not yet been invaded by ‘scientific’ theoretical approaches which involve statistics, but for anybody who can’t avoid the subject, this is a very enjoyable introduction.

© Roy Johnson 2007

Using Statistics   Buy the book at Amazon UK
Using Statistics   Buy the book at Amazon US


Gordon Rugg, Using Statistics: a gentle introduction, Open University Press: Maidenhead, 2007, pp.137, ISBN: 0335222188


More on study skills
More on writing skills
More on online learning


Filed Under: Study skills Tagged With: Data management, Research, Statistics, Study skills, Using Statistics

Get in touch

info@mantex.co.uk

Content © Mantex 2016
  • About Us
  • Advertising
  • Clients
  • Contact
  • FAQ
  • Links
  • Services
  • Reviews
  • Sitemap
  • T & C’s
  • Testimonials
  • Privacy

Copyright © 2025 · Mantex

Copyright © 2025 · News Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in