CategoryNavigation

Click on the title to see a list of pages that talk about navigating HyperMedia.

Gloor, P. A. (1997) Elements of hypermedia design: Techniques for navigation. Boston: Birkhäuser.: Old and boring. --ss

There are various aspects to navigation in CyberSpace. First, indexing: how do you do it, if at all?

A ForwardIndex provides the most flexibility, presenting exactly what you want exactly how you want it, and consequently has the highest maintenance cost.
A ReverseIndex sacrifices presentation flexibility for cheaper maintenance.
Many automatic indexes can be found on the IndexingScheme page, sacrificing flexibility for mass data-mining.
You might also consider creating some PathsInHypermedia instead of an index. One example, albeit an inter-site one, is the wiki TourBus.
CategoryCartography covers how to map CyberSpace in the first place.

Second, how do you present your navigation structure?

A BookMetaphor is a very familiar interface, potentially reducing redundancy and illogic in a site, but at the expense of power to the users.
HubAndSpoke is the dominant navigational method used when browsing the web. This has implication for how wide and deep to make your navigation structure. InterfaceHyperdepth also discusses this trade-off.
The VisualThesaurus has a lovely 3D Java interface showing how words connect. This is just a part of CategoryInformationVisualization.
A VirtualReality interface may be possible someday.

How do you connect related sites?

A WebRing is a hazy notion of creating a ring (or alternatively a dense set of connections) between related sites.
Generalising the WebRing is WebWeb. Though perhaps this is covered by part of WebRing? Decide for yourself; this page is an argument from April 2001.

Finally, no theory is complete without studies:

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