Information Systems for Urban Problem Solvers

Information systems are classified according to their role in problem solving. A new conceptualization of problem solving makes more precise the distinction between well-defined problems, which we try to solve, and ill-structured problems, with which we try to cope. For information systems to help with well-defined problems an analog to Shannon’s coding theorem is suggested. Eleven principles for the design of information systems to help with ill-structured problems are formulated.