Information Architecture Blueprints For The Web

Title: Information Architecture: Blueprints for the Web

Author: Christina Wodtke

ISBN: 0735712506

Publisher: New Riders Publishing

Price: US$ 29.99 (currently selling at US$ 20.99 at Amazon.com)

Page Count: 368

Publication Date: 16 October 2002

This book is full of that kind of energy that makes it hard to stop reading.

You can tell that Christina Wodke takes IA as something very personal, and has

placed all that passion into these pages.

She starts by making a solid case for IA, then proceeds to ditch the

gurus and their hard rules with braveness and wit. Next, she opens her

toolbox, and starts showing you an impressive set of tools which are exhaustively

described, with all the secrets you need to use them effectively and great

examples. It's the most practical book on Information Architecture that

I've read so far.

It doesn't matter if you are new to the discipline or an experienced

architect, you'll still learn lots of useful stuff. The traditional subjects

of IA are presented in a refreshing point of view, and it explains subjects

that nobody before had revealed, with clarity and detail. For example:

best practices for developing user research, how to build a good taxonomy,

a great chapter on interaction design, and all you need to know about

documentation - just to mention sample topics that were particularly relevant

to me.

Then she wraps it all up into an exercise project, and as if that wasn't

enough the goes on to give you greats bits of advice on how to be a better

professional, like how to get out of a creativity block and how to win

the respect of the people you work with. Prof. Norman is best as describing

it in the back cover: "what else can you ask for?"

Within the first pages she says it's a small book, I'd say that's not

quite precise. She also says she's put her whole brain into this book,

she surely did. So my recommendation would be: don't waste the chance

to feed on a really bright brain.

She also says hello to evolt.org in the Acknowledgements page :)

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