Comparing user and software information structures for compatibility

Abstract

Eastern and Western cultures differ quite systematically in how they group objects, functions and concepts into categories [1,2,3]. This has implications for how navigation features, such as menus, links, directories, should be designed in software applications. This is particularly of interest when the application is developed in one culture for use in a second culture. This paper presents this problem and discusses some approaches to comparing user and software information architectures both visually and quantitatively. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.