Strategy: Bottom-Up Information Architecture
The bottom-up approach focuses on creating building blocks that are the components of the web page, web project, or web site. The developer creates content objects that are organized for easy storage and access. In basic web projects, this may be a series of web pages organized with an index page.
For example, a school library media center might develop a book review project that contains a separate page for each book review. Each page might contain the name of the book, author, genre, cover art, book review, reading level, and reviewer. In high-end websites, it may be a complex database that can access information many different ways. For example, online catalogs can be very sophisticated.
Database Approach
Many websites are set up using this type of organization with individual pages that are all connected through a "home page", index, or search tool. Most beginning web developers simply use their "first page" as the "front-end" for their pages rather than using a formal search tool. However, you should still keep the database idea in mind. In other words, if you develop a consistent format for each of your pages, it will be much easier for people to find their way around. This consistency may simply be a consistent "area" of the page for navigation, titles, paragraphs, headings, and review. Another way to establish this consistency is to use CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) to promote a consistent use of fonts, sizes, styles, colors, etc.
Go to Butterflies and Moths of North America. Examine the way that the information is organized and accessed.
The easiest way to develop a bottom up site is focusing on creating individual web pages and connecting them with links. However, there are other ways to generate web pages. For example, dynamic web pages can be generated by using traditional database software such as FileMaker or Microsoft Access. Data is automatically inserted into a web page template based on a search. It's much like using the "mail merge" to create a personalized letter using Microsoft Word and Access. Websites such as Amazon, e-bay, recipes website, etc. use this type of system. Most beginners create individual web pages with links, rather than developing a formal database.
Go to the Visual Elements Periodic Table example. This project contains content objects for each element. It includes information such as name, symbol, number, the origin of the word, a description, image and who, where, and when it was discovered. The information is accessed through a visual map index.
In many bottom-up projects, the information is organized in a database format.
Go to the USDA Plants Database. It contains information about a wide range of plants including the technical name, common name, symbol, group, family, growth habit, duration, image, and US nativity. A word search is used to find the desired information by common name, scientific name, and symbol. For example, you can search for poison ivy.
Content objects are discrete pieces of information.
Go to the Collection Finder section of the Library of Congress: American Memory exhibit. Explore a collection using the keyword search or browse by subject, author, or title. Also, read about how the collection was built and cataloged. These collections were organized using the bottom-up approach. Like a catalog record, each content object contains atttributes such as a call number, creator, data, digital ID, format, notes, subjects, title, and statement of responsibility. In addition, each object contains attribute values. For example, in the Presidential Inaugurations collection you can view a photograph of the Lincoln's second inaugural. The creation date is an attribute and the attribute value is 1865.
Granularity
Granularity involves the level of complexity of a content object. The levels are from coarsely grained to finely grained content objects. Coarsely grained content objects are bigger chunks that many have many small parts such as websites, collections of things, and database. Finely grained content objects are smaller pieces such as graphics, documents, web links, video clips, or audio clips.
Library catalogs and links pages are common examples of bottom-up approaches.
Benefits of Bottom-Up
Why spend the time to think in terms of the bottom-up approach? If you start out with identifying a standard set of attributes for content objects, your website will be much easier to access. In addition, the consistency will help users find the information they need. You don't need to develop a complex database structure, it may simply be a standard layout for similar pages with an easy-to-use index.
Go to the 42explore project. The website is made of hundreds of individual pages that include the topic, graphic, definitions, top annotated links, activity ideas, websites by children, additional websites, teacher websites, and vocabulary.
Three types of indexes are provided including a date index that lists topics in chronological order by the day they were posted, a topic index that lists all topics alphabetically, and a subject index that lists topics alphabetically within school subject areas. Additional indexes could be added such as a listing by Dewey number.
Examples
Let's explore some simple, bottom-up examples from schools and libraries:
Book Reviews - This page contains an alphabetical list of book reviews including the title, author, book review, and reviewer. There's also a place where students can submit their own reviews.
Guardians of Freedom - This page contains the 5th and 6th grade student projects from the World War II Oral Histories Project. The oral histories can be accessed by location served and alphabetical order.
Skokie Public Library Program Information - This page provides library program information in the categories of computer classes, exhibits, films, lectures, literary events, and performances & cultural events. Within each page it contains the resources and a description.
Teachers Share Their Favorite Books - This page provides an alphabetical list of teachers at the top of the page. Each teacher section contains the name of the teacher, a list of book titles and authors, and a photograph of the teacher.
Worthington Memory - This online scrapbook of Worthington History contains 372 items dating from 1803 to the present. It can be searched or browsed.
Choose one of the following topics: oral history projects, standards-based lesson plans, special events (i.e., banned book week, reading month, Women's history month), student poetry archive, subject area links, teacher favorite books, or come up with your own. Brainstorm the attributes of the content objects in a web project on this topic.Brainstorm other types of content-rich projects that could be organized using the bottom-up approach.