The Architecture

of Understanding

Peter Morville, Midwest UX

Nature

Isle Royale National Park

Planning

Inspiration

Planning

PlayingPracticin

g

“With respect to learning by failure, it’s all fun and games until someone gets a larval cyst in

the brain.”

Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not

simpler.

“There is a problem in discussing systems only with words. Words and sentences must, by necessity, come only one at a time in linear, logical order. Systems happen all at once. They are connected not just in one direction, but in many directions simultaneously.”

The design and management

of information systems.

Understanding the nature of information in systems.

Categories

Categories are the cornerstones of cognition and culture.

We use radio buttons when checkboxes or sliders would reveal the truth.

Connections

HyperlinksPages

I n f o r m a t i o n A r c h i t e c t u r e

Web

PathsPlaces

Space

I n f o r m a t i o n A r c h i t e c t u r e

ConnectionsCategories

Mind

I n f o r m a t i o n A r c h i t e c t u r e

ConsequencesActions

Time

I n f o r m a t i o n A r c h i t e c t u r e

“The system always kicks back.”

“How can I know what I think until I see what I say?”

Culture

National values are fixed. Organizational practices are not.

Double-loop learning in organizations (and individuals) is rare.

The relationship between information and culture.

“There’s a secret about MRIs

and back pain: the most

common problems physicians

see on MRI and attribute to

back pain – herniated, ruptured,

and bulging discs – are seen

almost as commonly on MRIs of

healthy people without back

pain.”

“If you want to accelerate

someone’s death, give him

a personal doctor. I don’t

mean provide him with a

bad doctor. Just pay for

him to choose his own.

Any doctor will do.”

Limits

“It is now my suggestion that many

people may not want information,

and that they will avoid using a

system precisely because it gives

them information…If you have

information, you must first read it.

You must then try to understand it.

Understanding the information may

show that your work was wrong, or

may show that your work was

needless. Thus not having and not

using information can lead to less

trouble and pain than having and

using it.”

Calvin Mooers

(1959)

The limits of information

“We shape our buildings. Thereafter, they shape us.” – Winston Churchill

“Tell me about a day in your life.”

“Willpower is the single most

important keystone habit for

individual success.”

“A culture of generosity.”Josie Parker, Ann Arbor District Library

Daylighting

Daylighting

“Where architects use forms and spaces to design

environments for inhabitation, information architects

use nodes and links to create environments for

understanding.”

Jorge Arango, Architectures (2011)

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the

universe.”

John Muir

Thank You!IA Therefore I Am