Located: research topics > web navigation

Contextual navigation: turning mouse clicks into user preferences

Authors: Geldof, S. (1998)

Abstract: A descriptive article of contextual navigation methods adopted in a software model called Ecran total. The technology allows development of hyperlinking content based on user profiles by trapping mouse clicks and turning them into preferences then customising navigation content.

The Ecran Total system uses a movie review site as an example of the strategy and software behind this version of contextual navigation.

As a user clicks topic areas and links, and makes queries via the search engine, the system traps the information and considers it an explicit indication of current interests.

It then serves up pages which have information and links tailored to those interests.

The strategy, while appearing useful at face value, has wider implications in terms of privacy (under this system each user eventually has a detailed personal profile of preferences stored in a database somewhere) and business pressures (this database becomes a saleable commodity to marketers very quickly).

An interesting component of the technology is the topic and sentence generator, which will construct meaningful sentences with links based on preference information. In the example used, it is applied in a mechanical way, but with some humanising could have useful applications for providing personal assistance to web site navigation and usage.