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TopOverview Of The Container Blocks
The building block system includes seven types of Containers, beginning with the Tile at the lowest level of the stacking hierarchy, and increasing (conceptual) size and complexity to include a collection of interconnected Dashboards or Portals, called a Dashboard or Portal Suite. From smallest to largest, the Container blocks are:
Like musicians in a band, the different kinds of Container blocks in the system play different roles in the overall effort to construct dashboards or portals. The smaller (lower in the stacking hierarchy) blocks - Tiles, Tile Groups, and Views––enable the display of content, and support users’ interactions with content. Sections, Dashboards or Portals, and Dashboard or Portal Suites––the larger blocks, that are higher in the stacking hierarchy––enable the navigation, organization, and management of collections of content. Pages straddle the middle of the size continuum; they are the largest block whose role is primarily to provide a framework for display of and interaction with dashboard or portal content, and the smallest Container which plays an important navigational / organization role in the system.
The Connectors (described later in this article) ‘hold things together’; thereby creating navigation paths amongst destinations, establishing a tangible architecture or structure, providing referential cues for orientation with the environment, and allowing movement into and out of the environment. The different kinds of Containers work in concert with Connectors to enable the creation of scalable, navigable, and easily maintainable information architectures that support high-quality user experiences.
Each Container definition includes:
TopTile
Mandatory Components: Tile Header, Tile Body
Optional Components: Tile Footer
Stacking Size: 1