We have noted that navigation is suggested by your website storyboard or flowchart. The hierarchy of pages and their relationships and their content suggest "paths" a user might follow. However, users often want more flexibility in getting around a site and in jumping from one functional area to another than the hierarchical paths. It is the web designer's task to provide good site navigation and to do so without requiring the user to rely upon the browser's navigational tools.

The chart below lists some common Navigation tool conventions that a website designer would use. We will look at advanced tools below in this lesson.

Navigation Basics: 

What's the worst thing that can happen for the business that has a site poorly planned for visitor navigation? I can think of several possibilities, all bad.

• orphan pages
• leave the site with no way back
• didn't bookmark, page isn't named properly and can't remember the URL
• lost in long, vertically scrolling pages
• Can't find what you want or the way back to where you were
• navigation doesn't logically suggest your location or the "path" you followed with clicks
• others?

The chart below gives examples of navigation features commonly used to get around the parts of a website or to jump between websites. The site architect designs the website's navigation with these. When it comes to navigation of the Internet, the website architect has the goals of:

• making it easy and accurate for the visitor to get around the site,
• stay on the site,
• know where they are at all times and,
• if you leave the site, find your way back.

Interestingly, Web browsers also allow you to navigate within and between sites. However, their goals aren't the same as the Web architects and often thwart the visitor's attempts at navigation. Frequently, the visitor can get confused or lost when using the browsers navigational tools. Consider the following:

Other, somewhat more advanced Webpage navigation tools include:

• popup browser windows - This can be done as:
  • onMouseOver - example
  • onClick
  • Check Browser
    
• redirects to a page in a new Window or Tab - The link opens a new browser window even though the new browser window may cover the first, you know it is new because the Back button won't function and you'll see two active browsers in the Windows toolbar at the bottom of your screen. example
• redirects to a new or different page - click here for directions
• frame sets
• Frames Examples:
  http://www.bstar.net/bermudatriangle/
  http://www.laketahoerentalworks.com/mainpages/sites.html
• site search engines

Another common way to navigate a site takes more planning and is very effective if done correctly. Many Web sites, and all eCommerce sites should, include a Site-Specific Search Engine. A search engine can automatically index your site content once or several times a day.

Site-Specific Search Engines are fairly easy to set up but difficult to set up effectively. Many sites are not well-planned before they are built. Rather, they grow sort of organically or in leaps as the site becomes popular. This can lead to a navigation nightmare and to a site-specific search engine returning poor results. 

There are three principle ways to get a site indexer (site search engine). You can either pay for a site search engine, find freeware site search engines or use a search form component created in an authoring tool.

The book "Information Architecture for the World Wide Web", by Rosenfeld and Morville, published by O'Reilly has an excellent chapter on all aspects of setting up a site-search engine. (Chapter 6, Searching Systems).

A well-planned site search will choose between indexing the entire site versus creating search zones  to help the user narrow their site search to pertinent information and pages.

Another element of a well-planned site search is to recognize the users information needs and provide search capability of your site based upon those needs, including the method of indexing your site and the choice of indexing software to load or purchase. Users will do one or more of the following:

1. Search for a known item - a clearly defined search; likely providing a single, correct answer.
2. Existence Search - the user knows what they want but not how to describe it. 
3. Exploratory Search - users know how to phrase the question but are unsure of what they will find. They are exploring and learning and will do multiple searches.
4. Comprehensive Search - research; users want everything available on the topic

A last consideration is to build a good user interface for the search tool and the returned results or make sure the indexing software you buy or download has a serviceable interface or can be customized and integrated into your site design concept.

Knowing the above puts the navigational needs of the user and the goals of the website business into the web architects hands. The site designer must consider how to make the site navigable for the user but also has the responsibility of keeping the visitor at the intended site.

Additionally, this sort of attention to detail reminds us as business people that every little thing counts. A few extra customers here and a few lost there often make the difference between profitability or loss.

Let's try a few sites for testing their navgation and assessing how we used their site tools versus the browser tools.
1) John Wiley and Sons, Inc. - Order a free examination copy of Core Concepts of Consulting by Nancy Bagranoff, Stephanie Bryant and James Hunton (Handout).
http://jws-edcv.wiley.com/college/category/1,,BUSC-ACC,00.html
2) Value Audio- Order a Home Theatre System. http://www.value-audio.com/
3) Cabrillo College - Find Online Courses and find out what OWL is. http://www.cabrillo.cc.ca.us/ ; Find the instructors office hours page.
                                            http://www.cabrillo.cc.ca.us/instruct/instruct/officehours/
4) Go to Verisign and find the product called Payflow Link and prepare to order it. http://www.verisign.com/siteMap.html