Architect or librarian?

A new idea to me: the architect as librarian. Today, I read Mark Bernsteins review of a book about information architecture, titled Architect or Librarian?

[The authors] are librarians by training, and the “information architect” they envision is really a librarian. The information architect is concerned with cataloging, signage, and search, with making sure that each item in the inventory is stored in the proper place, and that it is described in the proper way.

This is an analogy that could be relevant for software architecture. I don’t know much about classification systems used in libraries, but I’d be surprised if they were completely unintuitive and required librarians to memorize them in their entirety. If I’d guess how classification systems work, I’d say that they are based on a rather simple set of rules that allows its users to deduce the classification of a particular book from the system’s rules.

Along the same lines, if you are hip with the principles of the architecture of some system, you’d be able to locate where a particular piece of functionality would belong. For a building, if I say “skyscraper,” you’ll know that it is a very tall one, with dozens and dozens of floors, accessible using any of several elevators, and so on.

The article also contained the following passage, which I liked:

Architects have always competed with craftsmen, construction firms, and engineers; what architects offer is an original and coherent vision that inspires and entire Web site or building.