[IA Research] Determine directory structure for content

[caylahamann]

Summary

There are over 5,000 markdown files that will be in the documentation site. We need to figure out a way to structure this content in our repository.

Procedure

Open up a PR merging into research. If there is no changes in the code (and only research details), you can just make an edit in a text file, since there is no plan to merge this into main. Use the PR template research_PR_template.md either by coping the markdown into the PR or by appending the query string ?template=research_PR_template.md to the URL. Fill out the template by answering the research questions listed below.

Research Goals

• Determine a file structure for content (is it determined by folder, by frontmatter ect.)
• Discuss solutions with engineers, content creators and PMs to determine best path forward

[zstix]

We spoke with some stakeholders and evaluated a few options. We have decided that we do not want to store all markdown files within a single directory. We would like to either make a fully-nested structure that mimics the category hierarchy or make a single-level structure where we have top-level category buckets.

Moving forward, we are going to try to migrate some content with one of these strategies and re-evaluate. I'm going to move this ticket to the next MMF, since that is when we will do that evaluation.

Meeting Notes

• Use a nested hierarchy to store the files, with the hierarchy reflecting where a doc actually lives (for example, a doc at the first level would live in /Folder-A , while a doc at the second level would live at Folder-A/Folder-B . And so on.
• We want the URL structure, the public-facing navigation, and the repo structure to all align.
• We'll re-check this decision a bit later on when we do a simple test migration with doc/navigation titles that match the actual site.
• Putting a doc in multiple places in the hierarchy is a technical puzzle we'll need to solve for.
• We'd also like to explore automation/tooling to ensure that the directory, URL, and navigation stay aligned and don't drift