Wireframing has held sway over UXers for the past 20 years. From its metaphoric origins in filmmaking to its pinnacle in countless UX books, wireframing stood as a key approach in defining both structure & interaction. In recent years, however, wireframing has come under attack. UX thinkers propose replacing wireframes with sketches and prototypes; yet we need to understand that bridge between idea and specification.
Kill Your Darlings: Solving Design by Throwing Away Your Prototypes
1. Kill Your Darlings
Solving Design by Throwing Away Prototypes
October 24, 2014
Joe Sokohl
@RegJoeConsults @MojoGuzzi
2. What We’ll Talk About
§A brief history of wireframing
§The benefits of prototyping
§Why throw away your work?
§A case study showing a redesign process as an
archetypal and practical approach
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11. What is a prototype, anyway?
Representa)ve
model
or
simula)on
of
the
final
system
Todd
Zaki
Warfel,
Prototyping:
A
Prac//oner’s
Guide
@RegJoeConsults!11
12. Why Should We Prototype?
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Reduced
risk
Smaller
systems
Less
complex
systems
Reduc)on
in
creeping
requirements
Improved
visibility
13. Why Should We Prototype?
@RegJoeConsults!13
Genera)ve
Show,
tell
&
experience
Reduc)on
of
misinterpreta)on
Savings
in
)me/effort/money
Reduc)on
of
waste
Real-‐world
value
17. As
I
see
it,
knowing
how
to
prototype,
test,
and
evaluate
results
quickly
is
the
most
valuable
skill
for
designers
of
persuasive
technology.
BJ
Fogg,
“Crea)ng
Persuasive
Technologies:
An
Eight-‐Step
Design
Process”
http://www.flickr.com/photos/rosenfeldmedia/3978302604/ @RegJoeConsultsI17
Cycle of Design
18. The Perils of Prototyping
Which is harder to change: a program with 1000 lines
of code or a 1000 square foot slab of concrete?
§ The concrete is ten inches thick and has steel reinforcing rods
criss-crossing within it. Every cubic foot of it weighs almost 100
pounds.
§ The software has almost no physical existence at all. It weighs
nothing. It consumes no space. A few microamps and those bits
flip from zero to one without a second glance.
The answer to my question seems a simple one,
doesn’t it?
http://www.cooper.com/journal/2008/05/the_perils_of_prototyping
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19. This is the first one. This is it exactly. This is my hand-wired
prototype, not a real Apple I or Apple ][ PC board. There are 4
white 2KB EPROMs on the upper board - that's how I developed
BASIC and all the other routines of the Apple I. This is an Apple ]
[ prototype. I can tell by how few chips it is. The Apple I had a
computer board attached to my video terminal board, in the
prototype stage." __Steve Wozniak
hUp://www.geekculture.com/joyoWech/joystuff/apple1cake/firstapple.jpg
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20. Use evolutionary prototypes (EVPs) when…
§User requirements are (almost) defined.
§Few interaction and visual design problems exist,
and information architecture is defined.
§UX team is highly experienced.
§UXers also create the deployable front-end code.
§Usability testing is summative, not formative.
§ Project requires little documentation.
!20
21. Use throwaway prototypes (TAPs) when…
§User requirements are ill-defined.
§Major interaction or visual design (or both) issues
remain, and the IA is not well defined.
§You have less experienced UXers.
§UX does not do development.
§Usability testing is formative and occurs multiple
times throughout the project.
§ Project requires detailed documentation.
!21
22. Screen
comps
Axure/Balsamiq/
iPlotz/iMockup...
Hand-‐coded
HTML
TAP TAP/EVP
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TAP EVP
Paper
Sketchflow/Expression
Edge
Fireworks
23. !23
Case Study
Melding sketches, quick wireframes, and prototyping
24. The Project: Redesign site into a modern, user-centered experience
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From this… To this…
25. We Did…
§Heuristic analysis
§Data analysis
§Market research analysis
§ Personas
§Mood boards & visual design
§ User journeys/scenarios
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28. Digital Exploration
!28
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