On 24/01/2008, David Malouf <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > The Thermo stuff is definitely interesting, but thinks like a graphic > designer, not like an interactive designer. Expression in their tutorials > anyway is thinking similarly. > > Basic assumption that is false that both are making is that I'm going to > make a finalized high fidelity graphic UI as a flat screen to start and THEN > add interactive elements. This goes against the very way IxD's have been > working.
Well said David, My view is that it goes even beyond wireframes and UI. I need a tool that understands all the elements I put into get to the final interfaces elements. I don't want to add the logic at the interface level but a level above. This means a tool that understands site maps and process flows. At the moment I see lots of folks doing diagram tools, I see a few prototype tools like Axure that are good for wireframes and out put specification documents (do people still use them?) and I see Designer to Dev tools like Expression and the forthcoming Thermo. Both of these, as a user experience specialist, are of no good to me but may be of use to the front end devs - they're implimentation tools not user experience tools. The tools I need is part CMS (this is more important that you'd think), part diagram tool (visual representation is very important - I want control over how things look), part development tool (it needs to tie into a developement process not create a throw away prototype) and part project management tool (version control, issue logging, change tracking). So get a good CMS, add on a new kind of sitemap / process flow tool, allow sketching, allow me to create libraries of items with inheritance (so I can set up a relationship between items, change all my drop downs from my black and white version to, say, Vista style boxes), allow content to be entered and managed tagged and organised. Yes it does sound like I want a swiss army knife but I feel in my work all these elements are so closely related and are part of the same story. I've come to accept that Adobe or Microsoft would never design such a tool as for both of these companies user experience is about Visual Design and Developers, use user exeprience folks don't appear to exist in their world. I feel there is a huge gap in the market but I have yet to see anything get even remotely close to what I'm imagining. I live in hope that someone has been secretely working on something like this - if you are let me know :) Stewart Dean ________________________________________________________________ *Come to IxDA Interaction08 | Savannah* February 8-10, 2008 in Savannah, GA, USA Register today: http://interaction08.ixda.org/ ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
