IAC: Information Architecture Conference

Session type: Pre-Conference Workshop

  • How To See Architecture – Walking Workshop: “Tuesday – Ducks”

    How To See Architecture – Walking Workshop: “Tuesday – Ducks”

    2023 IA Conference

    Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced

    No longer accepting registrations. We are only offering the Wednesday afternoon workshop

    as of March 5, 2023

    Join Dan Klyn for one or both of these half-day workshops, which are designed to equip participants with the BASIC framework for looking at the architectures of complex systems.  

    Attendees will get out of the conference hotel and into the streets of downtown New Orleans in a facilitated exploration of the myriad ways that features in the built environment are configured by people to store, distribute, and reify different kinds of information.

    No special knowledge or equipment is required to participate, and the walking route for each of the two half-days is exactly the same.  The pace of the walk will be very slow, and the distance we’ll cover adds up to just under 1 mile. 

    While covering the same ground and exploring the BASIC framework, each session will have a somewhat different focus:

    • The DUCKS session (Tuesday, March 28th in the AM) is focused on an analysis of one discreet site: Charles Moore’s glorious and notorious Piazza di’ Italia.
    • The DECORATED SHEDS session (Wednesday, March 29th in the PM) is focused on an analysis of Natchez Street, which connects the conference hotel to the Piazza.

    Agenda

    Klyn and up to 50 attendees will briefly muster in the lobby of the Intercontinental for a review of the Resources and Script for the workshop before sallying forth into the city to learn about the BASICs of seeing architecture through a close “reading” and analysis of architect Charles W. Moore’s internationally infamous Piazza Di’Italia (1976).

    • Quick intro to Klyn’s BASIC Framework
    • Walk to Piazza di’ Italia
    • Walk back to the Intercontinental
    • Debrief and Q&A

    Dan Klyn headshot
    Dan Klyn
  • Extending Reality: How to Design for the Metaverse

    Extending Reality: How to Design for the Metaverse

    2023 IA Conference

    March 28, 2023

    Beginner, Intermediate

    Extended Reality (VR, AR, MR, collectively XR) promises to change, or possibly replace, the world around us, immersing us in a different “”here and now”, be it a company-controlled Metaverse, a remote location on Earth, a fictional world, or a different, augmented version of our home or of familiar places such as our workplace or our favorite supermarket.

    But XR “elsewheres” are unique blends of digital and physical that introduce novel challenges and opportunities for designers, and that require knowledge and skills traditionally not associated with digital design practices. What happens when information is not conveniently bound to the 2D space of a screen but is instead disseminated and embedded into a 3D space? What if information IS what constitutes the 3D space? Where should we start?

    This learn-by-doing workshop will teach attendees the basics of designing for XR environments: it first introduces the basic differences between traditional IA / UX practice and IA / UX for XR; it anchors those differences to embodiment, sense of presence, and sensory and proprioceptive input; it describes how some of the issues we have with XR design are old issues we have solved, contextually, in other mediums, such as film or video games; it provides an initial set of best practices that can be applied to the high-level design of XR environments; it presents a few techniques to low-fi prototype XR solutions using pen, paper, and a smartphone.

    Pointers and references to in-depth exploration of the XR design space will be provided during the workshop.

    Andrea Resmini
  • Workshop 101: Design and Facilitation

    Workshop 101: Design and Facilitation

    2023 IA Conference

    March 29, 2023

    Intermediate

    A well-designed workshop is an excellent way to get things done. And as UXers, our skills uniquely position us to help clients and teams explore options and come to consensus, both in person and online. But successful workshops don’t happen by accident. And workshop design and facilitation aren’t really taught in school or on the job.

    Workshop 101 gives participants a flexible workshop-building framework. Participants will explore workshop activities, tools, and techniques. You’ll practice leading exercises, and will leave prepared to take the next step – whether leading a working meeting or delivering a workshop at a future conference. Importantly, you’ll discover that we don’t need to be a certain kind of person to do it. All of us can design and facilitate effective workshops from where we stand right now. Join us to translate your design thinking skills to create collaborative sessions that are fun, effective, and get work done.

  • Safe Tech Audit: Applying IA Heuristics for Digital Product Safety Testing

    Safe Tech Audit: Applying IA Heuristics for Digital Product Safety Testing

    2023 IA Conference

    Intermediate, Advanced

    Are you creating products that respect the needs and autonomy of your users? Are you concerned about how GDPR, CPRA and the proposed ADPPA data privacy regulations might affect your digital product? Would you like to learn how to evaluate your digital products for safe technology behavior?

    It’s possible to measure ethical behavior of technology, and Information Architecture heuristics provide a useful testing framework.

    Building on the Safe Tech Audit presented at IAC22, this full day workshop will discuss the role of usability and application of Abby Covert’s Information Architecture Heuristics in technology development standards from the 2011 National Strategy for Trusted Identity in Cyberspace to the Internet Safety Labs’ ISL Safe Technology Audit. You will learn to use the framework to perform a product integrity test of a web technology of your choice.

    In Part One, you will learn:

    • What are technology specifications and how are findability, understandability, accessibility and usability factors in developing them?
    • How do the various data privacy laws affect the use and control of personal data?
    • How can Information Architecture inform the design of safe and respectful apps and websites?

    In Part Two, you will:

    • Perform Safe Technology audits to measure product safety of a website and compare different kinds of technologies (news sites, social media, university websites, retail stores, etc.)
    • Select a website or app of your own to test and develop a plan to address any negative results (you won’t be required to share the results if you don’t wish to)
    • As a group, we will create an artifact to present on IAC23 Poster Night

    Noreen Whysel
    Noreen Whysel
  • Domain Modeling for Digital Information Designers

    Domain Modeling for Digital Information Designers

    2023 IA Conference

    March 28, 2023

    Intermediate, Advanced

    As Information Architects, we get called into projects to structure, organize, and optimize complex information systems to meet business and user goals. All too often, however, these systems are plagued by unwritten assumptions and tacit rules. Domain Modeling is an activity designed to uncover and create a shared vision of the conceptual information space—the “”Domain”—in which an organization and its users operate.

    This full day, hands-on workshop will situate domain modeling in IA project contexts and interactively walk participants through two equally important domain modeling phases: identifying, defining, and validating the core concepts in the subject domain in question, and then mapping and validating the principal relationships between those concepts. We’ll close the session with a discussion of putting domain models into action and using them to drive and align project activities and outcomes.

    Andy Fitzgerald