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Software Engineering vocabulary · Web, Mobile and Interface Development

Information architecture

Meaning in software engineering, with examples

nounCore term

In software engineering, information architecture means: The way content and features in a website or app are organised, grouped and labelled so that people can find what they need and understand where they are.

In Turkish: bilgi mimarisi

How it is used

Often shortened to IA, said letter by letter. Designers work on IA when planning menus, categories and page structure, using sitemaps, card sorting and tree testing. A messy IA is a common reason why users 'can't find anything'.

Example sentences

  1. Before we redesign the menu, we need to fix the information architecture.

  2. The information architecture has grown to six levels, which is far too deep.

Common collocations

  • clear information architecture
  • restructure the information architecture
  • information architecture review
  • IA diagram
  • sitemapA file, usually sitemap.xml, that lists the pages of a website so that search engines can find and crawl them more easily.
  • navigationThe menus, links, tabs and other elements that let people move around a website or app and understand where they are.
  • card sortingA research method in which participants group topics written on cards into categories that make sense to them, showing how users expect content to be organised.
  • tree testingA research method that checks whether people can find items in a site's structure by showing them only a text menu tree, without any visual design.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Web, Mobile and Interface Development

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