Tridion Docs Genius: Where content clicks.
28 May 2024
6 mins
Ever needed to sift through loads of information to do a complex task? Imagine your job is to set up a new, intricate piece of equipment within a few hours. It's not just about following a set of steps; you need to grasp the bigger picture. In this complexity, it's not enough to assume that a single page will be enough to help you complete your goal. Instead, you need to be able to synthesize multiple bits of information, consider how they fit together so that you can make informed decisions. It's like building a puzzle, where each piece of information contributes to the larger understanding needed to get the job done.
Traditional content delivery doesn't meet these demands of our customers. They want to find information seamlessly, without the hassle of sifting through endless content to make connections themselves.
So, the question is: how can we provide our customers with a better way to deliver their structured content so that their users can find the right information to get their job done? This is where our innovation comes into play culminating in a new module for Tridion Docs: “Genius”. Lacking a better word, we’ll call it a knowledge portal for now. But as you continue reading, you’ll quickly find out that this term is heavily underselling our innovation.
Hexahops: A novel approach to discovering information
Stuck on a task? Frustrated by dead ends?
Choose your path through intelligent suggestions. As you move, new recommendations magically appear, leading you closer to your goal. Easy, intuitive, and efficient.
But Hexahops are more than just suggestions. They unlock a treasure trove of in-context recommendations, weaving a path through relevant content. Forget endless, confusing choices. Here, we showcase the clear connections between the top 6 topics to keep users on the right track.
Trustable chat: Your information companion
Chat UIs are commonplace nowadays, but ensuring they provide reliable information is another challenge altogether.
Our Trustable Chat in Tridion Docs Genius is a conversational AI assistant designed to accompany you throughout your journey. It goes beyond simple communication; it aims to reassure users by guiding them towards the most accurate answers, in human language. Our aim is to ensure reliability and authenticity, by doing two things:
- No fake answers! Semantic AI digs into your trusted sources to find the truth. Your users talk with the language model to quickly get the picture. When they need more context, they click a reference to find the original source.
- Want proof? We’ll show you where we found everything, so you can see for yourself how reliable it is.
Customization and extensibility: Your way
We understand every customer is unique, which is why we designed our portal with a modular, customizable foundation. Customers can easily tweak the look and feel to match their brand identity, seamlessly integrating it with their existing setup.
We’ve leveraged Google's Material UI framework to ensure the portal is pixel-perfect and consistent across platforms. We prioritize accessibility too, supporting assistive technologies and adhering to WCAG 2.1 standards for optimal inclusivity.
And if your users need more functionality to help them get a job done? No problem! Our portal makes it simple to link external data and widgets to suit your context.
When reimagining the new and improved portal experience, we followed the key principle that “Every Page is Page One” , which we’ve interpreted as:
- Nothing is straight forward: Users these days don't follow a neat path to find the information they need, they bounce around through pages, treating each page as an entry point and expecting instant value.
- Searchability is key: Users expect information to be findable, discoverable, like magic (or at least Google). Every page needs to be optimized for searchability and understandability.
So, we aimed to ensure each piece of content is well-defined, easy to navigate, and valuable on its own, regardless of where it sits within the larger structure. After gathering requirements, whiteboarding and analyzing our existing offering, we decided on a set of practical design principles:
- Clarity and focus: Clear hierarchy, minimal distraction, concise content with clear affordances.
- Scannability and findability: Where content is positioned in an F-shaped layout, there is enough whitespace and where navigation is intuitive, think internal linking, breadcrumbs, clear menus, etc.
- Accessibility: Ensuring that the design is simple and consistent, responsive and takes a mobile first approach.
Keeping these three areas in mind helped us design a holistic user experience.
This isn't just an application update; it's a reimagining of how people find what they need when they need it. We believe our novel approach is a change in thinking about how users interact with structured content. Enabling them to do their jobs better seamlessly and intuitively, leading the way for a new era of content delivery.
Curious to learn more? View our on-demand webinar that highlights what's coming in our latest Tridion Docs release, v15.1.
Tasmin Donaldson
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