Artifact: Navigation Map

This artifact describes the structure of the user-interface elements in the system, along with their potential navigation pathways.

Domains: Analysis and Design
Work Product Kinds: Model

Purpose

There is one Navigation Map per system. The purpose of the Navigation Map is to express the principal user interface paths through the system. These are the main pathways through the screens of the system and not necessarily all of the possible paths. It can be thought of as a road map of the system's user interface.

The Navigation Map serves as a backdrop and a link between the individual Storyboards. The Storyboards describe how the user moves navigates through the user-interface elements to perform system features and the the Navigation Map defines what the valid navigation paths are. The Navigation Map conveys the structure of the system's user interface, and the Storyboards convey the dynamics.

The Navigation Map makes it easy to see how many "clicks" it will take a user to get to a specific screen.

Relationships

Roles	Responsible: User-Interface Designer	Modified By: User-Interface Designer
Tasks	Input To: Prototype the User-Interface Review the Design	Output From: Design the User Interface

Tailoring

Representation Options

A variety of representations may be used for the Navigation Map. Some examples include:

A hierarchical "tree" diagram, where each level of the diagram shows the number of clicks it takes to get to a specific user-interface element
Free-form graphics with custom icons.

The selected representation and any tailoring decisions should be documented in the project-specific guidelines.

More Information

Concepts	Representing Graphical User-Interfaces
Guidelines	User Interface (General)