IA-based Enterprise Website Design And Development

Richard Saul Wurkman, an American Architect, coined the term of"Information Architecture" in the mid 1970s. He also defined theprofessional information architect. This concepts didn't catchpeople's eye at that time. The term was discovered again in the late1990s.Then IA became one of the website developing steps in US, which makesthe website information service stride forward greatly in meeting user'sneeds, and makes the website's usability improved greatly. The IA studyat home is still in its infancy, it has become one of the highlightingstudies in the fields of information science.With the development of social and Internet, Chinese enterprisesconstruct their own websites, in order to profit from them. Howeverbecause the usability research was ignored, the information structure ofwebsite is obscure or illogical;it is not easy for users to find the usefulinformation. These problems are mainly caused by the lack of IA conceptin the website design. This article introduces IA into the constructionof enterprise website, in order to help enterprises with constructingtheir good websites IA, improving the website's usability. It willincrease the enterprise's profits ultimately. Today, when enterprisesare more aware of the importance of website development, studies onwebsite IA are significant both in theory and applications. This paper consists of five sections.Section one analyzes the meaning of IA and the present situation ofresearch overseas and domestic;introduces the components of enterprisewebsites, and the general procedures to construct enterprise websites,then pointes out our website's problems;elaborates on the purpose ofconstructing IA-based enterprise websites finally.Section two discusses the core content about website IA: organizationsystems, labeling systems, navigation systems and search systems,analyzes the meaning ,the type and the trait of this four systems;at lastthe dissertation analyzes the work of the information architect and thepurpose of the website's IA.Section three, the essential section of this paper, also is the newviewpoints. The innovations lie in:1. The process of the IA-based website development is discussed. First,the enterprises need setting up the information architect, and make surehis responsibility. The author puts forward the development of IA-basedenterprise website consists of three processes: information architecture,design and issuance, management and maintenance. As the first process,IA will determine the website's success. The author illuminates themeaning if the IA process, then puts forward the process of IA: researches,organization of information, design the information structure. Detailedprocess and technology are discussed, too.2.The author concludes that designing with web standards accordswith the concept of IA. So designing with web standards should be usedin the IA-based website development, aiming at improving the usabilityof the website. The author elaborates the meaning and the technologycriterion of Web Standards, analyzes the procedure and technology of thetransition.3.A method of IA-based website evaluation is discussed: an indexsystem evaluation based on Analytic Hierarchy Process(AHP).In section four, IA is applied into practice of the domesticenterprise website design. The author analyzes the situation of Jinan Iron& Steel Group Corporation's website IA, finds the insufficiency in theorganization systems, labeling systems, navigation systems and searchsystems. The main page is redesigned with Web standards: the informationis adjusted and increased, navigation function is improved by addingnavigation bar and pull-downs menus, search function based on productsis increased. At last, by analyzing the new page, the availability of IAis proved.In section five, concludes the main work and the shortage in this paper,and points out the next work.Several research methods are used in this dissertation, includingSystem analysis, Literature Review, Analysis, Case Study, etc….