
This glossary reflects proposed terms within the context of information architecture theory, science, and practices based on DSIA Research. Terms are added to this public glossary because they have been mentioned in a publication or are scheduled for future disclosure. Hence, this public glossary does not reflect the exhaustive list of DSIA-based terms.
See also “What is Information Architecture?” for additional context.
Last Updated: 1/14/2022
A
Abstract Construct
A conceptual relationship between two or more unique entities.
Abundance (Information Overload: Signature)
An excessive amount of information and content. See also information overload.
Activity Branch
(Activity branch definition coming soon.)
Activity Phase
(Activity phase definition coming soon.)
Architectural Intent
The rationalized objective of two or more reciprocating entities within a domain of behavior.
Application User Interface
Definition pending
Application User Interface (AUI) Function
A function of network computing where human behavior is the central performance dependency.
- Related article pending review
Application Technology Interface (ATI) Function
A function of network computing where technology is the central performance dependency.
- Related article pending review
Architecture (Activity Branch)
This definition of architecture has been temporarily removed.
Architecture (Project : Activity)
The collective effort to frame systemic, relational constraints in a way that provides context and reveals an expression for an explicit intent.
- Related Article: Project Accountability Model for UI Teams
Area of Interest
See: Subject Matter; relates to Practice Tier.
Assertion
A loosely supported concept that claims theoretical or practical relevance; conjecture.
B
Behavior Definitions
The collective set of models for the perceptive factors and tendencies within a given domain.
Boersma Assertion
The Peter Boersma assertion implies that the complete practice of user experience design overlaps or entails some aspect of every form of professional practice in the architecture and design of computing interfaces.
C
Classic Information Architecture (Practice)
A school of thought concerned with the strategy and design for navigating, organizing and relating information in ways that promote information findability, management, and use.
Common Set
An official grouping of probes and constructs that make up the tactical interests of information architecture in practice.
- Related Article: Putting IA theory into Practice
- Related Poster: Information Architecture: Common Set
Complex Domain
Describes the state of an information architecture where the physical and abstract constructs are not adaptive across modes and domains.
- Related Article: UI Structural Engineering 101
Conjecture
A conclusion deduced by surmise or guesswork.
— Source: Merriam-Webster
Contemporary Information Architecture (Practice)
“A school of thought concerned with the design of information environments and the management of an information environment design process.” — Source: Earl Morrough
Context Definitions
The collective set of models for the base objects and environmental relationships that constrain behavior.
Construct (Common Set)
See: Abstract Construct, Physical Construct
- Related Article: Putting IA Theory into Practice
- Related Illustration: Information Architecture Common Set
Content
A set of information structured by language for the purpose of an intended communication.
Content Component (Application UI)
An interrelated set of content objects used to enable an interactive presentation and engagement within a user interface.
Content Definition
The collective set of models for the concrete and abstract constructs that impart meaning in support of sustainable behavior.
Content Model (Application UI)
A model of related content objects and the inherent attributes they require to achieve an intended outcome for an application user interface.
Content Object (Application UI)
A presentation-based HTML element with which a user of an application user interface will engage. For instance: text, image, table, list, header, etc.
Content Module
A description (model) for a set of interdependent components; the parent container of one or more content components.
Content Type (Application UI)
A description (model) for a collection of interrelated content modules within an application user interface; the parent container of one or more content modules.
Context
The temporally interrelated conditions in which something exists or occurs.
Cross-Domain Information Architecture
A site information architecture that serves as the canonical model for accommodating and enabling multiple abstract and physical constructs across multiple subject domains.
D
Design (Activity Branch)
This definition of design has been temporarily removed.
Design (Project : Activity)
The collective effort to provide a solution within the respective constraints of architectural intent; “the rendering of intent” (Jared Spool).
- Related Article: Project Accountability Model for UI Teams
Design Solution
The outcome of design activity that serves as the representational requirement for an intentionally (with reference to architectural intent) built object.
Device
Equipment or a mechanism designed to serve a special purpose or perform a special function.
— Source: Merriam-Webster
Digital Literacy Gap (Information Overload: Signature)
The degree of education that a user needs in order to effectively use and contribute to a knowledge system and information architecture; literacy gap. See also, information overload.
Discipline
A system of rules of conduct derived from extensive practice.
Domain Extension
Integration of the physical and abstract constructs of UI structure into other physically independent domains.
Domain
A related set of concrete and/or abstract constituents (like a device, network of devices, or subject matter like Science or History).
Dynamic UI Structure
A reference model for UI structure that can be remediated via systematic structural intervention.
E
Empathy
The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another in either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner.
— Source: Merriam-Webster.
Engineering (Project : Activity)
The collective effort to rationalize a structure [5] that allows a design solution and architectural intent to instantiate in the intended context.
- Related Article: Project Accountability Model for UI Teams
Entity
Something that exists as a particular and discrete unit — Source: The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition.; object
F
Feedback (Information Overload: Signature)
The undesirable human performance or behavioral response as a consequence of an information overload event. See also information overload.
Filter Failure (Information Overload: Signature)
Ineffective controls for determining content quality and relevance. See also information overload.
First-Order Domain
An informational pattern that is the symmetrical grouping of multiple subject domains and their primary tiers.
G
H
I
Interaction Definitions
The collection of models that represents the affordances for engagement with an object within a given context.
IA
An acronym for the term information architecture.
Information
That which can be used as an asymmetric reflection of experiential phenomena and accommodate relationships with other phenomena to facilitate language; a building block for language.
Information Architect
A practitioner who designates the function of information architecture as their core competency or primary functional responsibility within a business organization.
Information Architecture
See: Information Architecture (Business Function); Information Architecture (Practice); Information Architecture (Work Product).
Information Architecture (Field of Study)
Information architecture (IA) is a field of study concerned with sustaining shared understanding and alignment with conceptual clarity.
Information Architecture (Business Function)
Information architecture is an organizational function responsible for simplifying how people navigate and use content that’s connected throughout an organization.
Information Architecture (Web Practice)
Information architecture is a practice concerned with the structural design and engineering of application user interfaces.
Information Architecture (Work Product)
The assumptions and governing constructs for assigning properties and attributes to information and the endowment and evolution of information relationships over time within a given domain; a governing model for information behavior within a digitally mediated environment; the governing framework for content behavior.
Information Domain
A set of modeled information behavior that includes properties, attributes, and base information.
Information Environment
A set of modeled information behavior that includes one or more information domains.
Information Overload
See: Micro Information Overload and Macro Information Overload.
- Related Article: IA Strategy: Addressing the Signatures of Information Overload
J
K
Koltay Assertion
The Tibor Koltay assertion argues that low digital (information) literacy contributes to the propagation of information overload. View Tibor Koltay’s original article.
L
M
Macro Information Overload
Where the abundance of information becomes a quantitative obstruction to an underlying intention of an information technology system.
- Related Article: Information Overload, Reloaded
- Related Article: IA Strategy: Addressing The Signatures of Information Overload
Micro Information Overload
Where the abundance of information becomes an obstruction to an underlying intention of an agent interacting with a system.
- Related Article: Information Overload, Reloaded
- Related Article: IA Strategy: Addressing The Signatures of Information Overload
Mode
The physical container and its inherent properties by which information is consumed on a device.
Multi-Domain Information Architecture
A site information architecture that accommodates and enables multiple abstract and physical constructs of multiple sites within a single subject domain.
- Related Article: “…How to Plan for a Successful Information Architecture Strategy“
N
Natural Domain
Describes the state of an information architecture where the abstract and physical constructs are adaptive across modes and domains.
Navigation
See: Physical construct
O
Object
See Entity.
Order Grid
The first order mapping of a segmentation.
P
Physical Construct
The interactive sequence and dependent nodes for a single or all directed paths to content within a domain; navigation and content designated for consumption.
- Related Article: Putting IA Theory into Practice
Practice
The collective behavior of intentional empirical probing around an area of interest, whereby the contribution of documentation of discovery enables a consensus that builds and reinforces discipline around such behaviors.
- Related Article: …It takes a village of practitioners to raise a discipline
Practice Tier
A single area of interest of a practice vertical.
- Related Article: UX Design Practice Vertical
Practice Vertical
A set of practice tiers that represent the primary areas of interest of a single professional practice.
- Related Article: UX Design Practice Vertical
Probe
A target set of perspectives or content relative to shared and dependent contexts.
- Related Article: Putting IA Theory into Practice
- Related Illustration: Information Architecture Common Set
Production (Project : Activity)
1) The collective effort to instantiate a design solution as a concrete object for use in accordance with its respective architecture, design, and engineering specifications; 2) the effort by which a product is made.
- Related Article: Project Accountability Model for UI Teams
Q
Quartet Compression
The co-dependent relationship between a technology platform, applications, information and an individual or group of people.
- Related Article: Information architecture, black holes, and discipline: On developing a framework for a practice of information architecture.
R
Reactionary Propagation
A perpetual cycle of increasing volatility and volume of use, adoption, and performance encouraged by a compression of human behavior.
- Related Article: Information architecture, black holes, and discipline: On developing a framework for a practice of information architecture.
S
Search Engine Optimization
A practice of improving the relevant discoverability of information by search engines.
Segmentation
A proposal for base properties within an information domain.
Single-Domain Information Architecture
A site information architecture that does not share its abstract or physical construct with other information sources with an intention.
Shirky Assertion
The Clay Shirky assertion implies that the failure to filter information properly is what humans are inaccurately interpreting as information overload. Nathaniel Davis describes filter failure as a signature of information overload.
- Related Article: It’s Not Information Overload. It’s Filter Failure.
Static UI Structure
A reference model for UI structure that relies on static documentation that does not support systematic intervention.
Structure
The coherent order and relations between physical and abstract constructs in support of a communicated design.
Subject Domain
The collective behaviors and vocabulary of an individual or group that directly relate to a unique subject matter or function within a business, organization, or social context.
Subject Matter
A topic of inquiry and discussion of a single or multiple subject domains; area of interest.
Syntax
Rules that govern how information forms linguistic constituents like words, phrases, images, gestures, and sounds.
Systematic Structural Intervention
The ability to manage and modify the structural properties of an application user interface within an integrated system.
- Related Article: UI Structural Engineering 101
T
Taxonomy
An abstract construct that reflects the collective division of entities into ordered domains arranged in a way that demonstrates parent-child relationships between domain constituents.
T-Model
A concept that argues how a multi-disciplinary practice is a set of shared subject matter from other unique practices, and how a practitioner’s added focus in a given practice vertical creates a “T” shape when graphically plotted.
Tier
Reflects an attribute within a property of a first-order grid; domain attribute
U
User Experience Design
A practice of determining the content, form, and behavior of a user interface and its related systems given the holistic exploration of situational context and user empathy.
UI Engineer
UI Engineering (User Interface Engineering)
UI Structure
The aggregate of a user interface’s underpinning conceptual relationships regardless of their static or dynamic nature.
- Related Article: What is Information Architecture? (Work Product)
UI Structural Debt
The implied cost of inefficiency and additional rework caused by either a lack of expertise or choosing a simplified approach over a better approach to save time.
- Related Article: UI Structural Engineering 101
UI Structural Engineer
One who applies the science of UI structure in professional practice and provides plans to mitigate structural failure.
UI Structural Engineering
A practice concerned with defining the structure of application user interfaces with the application of information architecture science.
- Related Article: UI Structural Engineering 101
User Interface (UI)
The apparatus a human uses to communicate as a proxy for computation, communication, or mechanical effort.
Utility Gap (Information Overload: Signature)
The amount of unused and unusable information stored within a domain. See also information overload.
V
Volatility (Information Overload: Signature)
The rate of information flow within a domain. See also information overload.
Revision History
Week of 12.07.2020
- Added new term – Information Architecture (Field of Study)
- Added related term – Object
Week of 12.20.2022
Added new term – Discipline
Week of 12.07.2020
Added new term – Information Architecture (Field of Study)
Week of 09.13.2020
- Corrected the definition of Information Architecture (Web Practice) to reflect the one used on the disambiguation page.
Week of 08.16.2020
- Added new term – UI Structure
- Added new term – UI Structural Debt
- Clarification – Added “: Signature” to better disambiguate the six information overload signatures.
- Added term – UI Structural Engineer
08.13.2020
- Renamed term – Active UI Structure is now Dynamic UI Structure
08.07.2020
- Renamed term – Conceptual UI Structure is now Static UI Structure
- Renamed term – Physical UI Structure is now Active UI Structure
08.06.2020
- Added new term – Application User Interface with definition pending
- Added new term – UI Structural Engineer with definition pending
- Edited description to improve clarity – Conceptual UI Structure
- Edited description to improve clarity – Physical UI Structure
- Edited description to improve clarity – Tier
07.29.2020
- Added new term – Conceptual UI Structure
- Added new term – Physical UI Structure
- Added new term – Systematic Structural Intervention
- Added new term – UI Engineering
- Added new term – UI Structural Engineering
06.26.2020
- Edited description to improve clarity – Content Component
- Edited description to improve clarity – Content Model
- Edited description to improve clarity – Content Module
- Edited description to improve clarity – Content Object
- Edited description to improve clarity – Content Type