[Zope-CMF] Searching vs. browsing

[Christoph Schirmer]

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I could´t agree more, also it needs to be said that a search in the cmf leaves you
with lots of findings that are irrelevant. But one still has to view many to realize
that.

I would very much appreciate a CMF book like the Zope book, or a site structure that
is ZMF-users centered, e.g. like the O´Reilly Cook books.

Cheers,
Christoph

Timothy Wilson wrote:

> On Fri, 13 Jul 2001, marc lindahl wrote:
>
> > Check out
> > http://cmf.zope.org/Members/grifter70000/color_guide
>
> Wow, this one link is going to save me a ton of work. Thank you!
>
> This also brings up an issue that I've recognized with the CMF recently. My
> sense is that navigation in a CMF-enable Web site, and cmf.zope.org in
> particular, are overwhelmingly search-oriented. The link given above and the
> content it provided were readily available with a quick search (it was 6th
> in the list of items returned when I used "stylesheet" as the search term),
> but completely invisible to a site visitor otherwise.
>
> Jakob Nielsen talks quite a bit about the need to make sure content can be
> found by "searchers" and "browsers."
>
> "My usability studies show that slightly more than half of all users are
> search-dominant, about a fifth of the users are link-dominant, and the rest
> exhibit mixed behavior. The search-dominant users will usually go straight
> for the search button when they enter a website. They are not interested in
> looking around the site; they are task-focused and want to find specific
> information as fast as possible. In contrast, the link-dominant users prefer
> to follow the links around a site. Even when they want to find specific
> information, they will initially try to get to it by following promising
> links from the home page. Only when they get hopelessly lost will
> link-dominant users admit defeat and use a search command. Mixed-behavior
> users switch between search and link-following, depending on what seems most
> promising to them at any given time, but they do not have an inherent
> preference." (Nielsen 224)
>
> I am not a search-dominant user. I use both techniques, but I do get
> frustrated when I visit a site and I'm forced to use the search feature to
> find what I want. The "me-centric" approach of the CMF would seem to require
> heavy use of the search functions. I'm hoping that Topics will be the tool
> that will allow me to present content in a way that site visitors can find
> easily by browsing.
>
> Any comments?
>
> References
> ==========
> Nielsen, Jakob, "Designing Web Usability", 2000.
>
> Later,
> Tim
>
> --
> Tim Wilson      |   Visit Sibley online:   | Check out:
> Henry Sibley HS |  http://www.isd197.org   | http://www.zope.org
> W. St. Paul, MN |                          | http://slashdot.org
> wilson@visi.com |  <dtml-var pithy_quote>  | http://linux.com
>
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>
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