On Jun 8, 2005, at 9:55 AM, Christopher Taylor wrote:
3. Taxonomy, Issue Term: Volume 1, Issue 1, Beginning 06-02-2005 Term: Volume 2, Issue 2, Beginning 06-06-2005
putting structured information like this into a taxonomy is not always the most efficient approach. One problem is that the taxonomy will grow without limit.
There is also an interface design issue. People do very poorly navigating and use long lists of items. While there are occasionally good reasons to create long taxonomy sets, it is something I usually try to avoid.
Since you do have well-structured information, another approach would be to use flexinode and create a new node type with several data fields, including a Volume data field (for the Volume number), Issue data field, date data field, and so on. You would, of course, also create a text area field that will hold the article.
For each node, you would also classify it according to one or more of the other taxonomies you have.
Also keep in mind that Drupal's full text search capability is your friend. People are very familiar with search engines like Google, and are relatively unfamiliar with searching by rigid classification schemes, in which you have to understand the classification scheme to make good use of it.
If most people can find most things they will want to search for using full text search, that's probably good enough.
Andrew
------------------------------------------------- Andrew Michael Cohill, Ph.D. Information architect
Design Nine provides technology master planning services, community network planning, technology audits, and telecommunications project management to communities and organizations trying to make wise technology and telecommunications expenditures. Design Nine represents the interests of the organization or community, rather than the interests of vendors.
Visit the Design Nine News page for frequently updated news and commentary on technology issues. http://www.designnine.com/news/
Design Nine, Inc. http://www.designnine.com/ Blacksburg, Virginia Voice: 540.951.4400 Cell: 540.320.4406