Papers in PDF format

our audience, fall into one of the six functions, and take advantage of one of the capabilities of the Web in
order to be justified as being included on our site.
In the case of the role of communicator discussed above, the creation of a central database of how to contact
people in Instructional Science would be a justifiable endeavor (an information function). We designed pages
listing each faculty, staff and student with office addresses, telephone numbers and email addresses. We
wanted to avoid simply creating an electronic directory which could be better provided in print form. Instead
we examined the features of the medium and created a page where the users could not only locate telephone
numbers and addresses but contact the party directly from their browser using the "mail to" feature in
Netscape. Our work models also indicated that frequently people were unsure of who could help them so calls
were made trying to identify the faculty or staff best able to answer their questions. Once the party was
identified, additional problems were encountered trying to make contact with the individual as frequently the
party was not in their office. Thus our pages were designed with hyperlinks for each person listed to provide
descriptions of their duties, interests and office hours to facilitate making contact with the correct individual
utilizing the unique hypertextual feature of the Web.
At the completion of this phase of development the team will have the work models, role delineations, list of
information needs and the proposed site content so that they may turn their attention to the design issues.
Design Process
Cognitive design considerations. Cognitive design refers to creating documents which address how the brain
receives, organizes, stores, recalls and utilizes data. Good design facilitates the integration of data into
existing schema by placing it in the context of established knowledge. If you want users to know how to locate
information at your site, organize it in a logical, predictable manner. Good metaphors can simplify this
integration by establishing parallels: reference documents can be located in a “virtual library”; chat forums can
be located in the “faculty lounge”.
The brain can deal with information easier if it is sequenced and grouped into logical units. A long list of
topics can lead to cognitive overload whereas a list organized into seven to nine natural categories is more
usable. One of the more challenging tasks we initially encountered in designing documents was how to create
whitespace to offset and highlight this grouping of data. While lists, buttons and icons helped, it was the
introduction of tables and the ability to color the background of individual cells that have allowed us to control
layout sufficiently to create truly user-friendly documents.
People have a need to see the logic in the organization of a Web site just as they do for any data. Presenting an
overview of the site’s structure provides an orientation mechanism just as a map does for an unfamiliar terrain.
People feel comfortable when they know where they are and can anticipate where they need to go to find
something.
We were able to use the roles we identified in the role delineation as a foundation for organizing the material
at our site.
Visual design and layout considerations. The design team next decides how the information will be
presented. Visual design addresses how pages will look and how information will be displayed. The Web was
such a new medium when we undertook the construction of our Web site that not many guidelines existed. We
endeavored to develop style guidelines of our own by surveying existing sites and analyzing what seemed to
work for us visually and what did not. Additionally, many of the principles of screen design for hypertext and
electronic documents were applicable for Web pages. As we surveyed different sites on the Web, we found we
were unwilling to read text-intensive pages and preferred those with concise, bulleted list. We concluded that
the sites we judged as good were those based on consistency (information structured in predictable ways),
simplicity (no gratuitous graphics or ”eye candy”), redundancy (using the same backgrounds, colors, graphics,
layout on similar document) and clarity (concise, well organized material).
Since reading text on a computer screen is generally slower than text on a printed page, it is particularly
important that the design team carefully considers how much text will be on a page and how it is organized if
they want users to read them. There should be a balance between text and graphics. Graphics should be
chosen on the bases that they are indeed the best way to communicate a concept. Pages should be kept short (1
1/2 to 2 screens) whenever possible. A carefully organized design that is consistent across pages will aid users