All drawing and diagramming tools that we use to create wireframes are based on shapes or widgets. You drag a widget from a palette and drop it onto the page, then set its position and size with mouse. The operation is easier if the editor supports snapping to the grid and guides.
I wonder however if this is the optimal way of drawing wireframes, because it doesn't account for their peculiarities, namely: * Content rectangles never overlap each other but cover the entire page "real estate" * Content rectangles are mostly aligned in columns and rows, i.e. often have one or more of their boundaries aligned to each other * During design, content areas frequently need to be rearranged – columns and rows are resized, content areas are swapped etc. So, I've got the idea that instead of presenting each content rectangle as a separate widget, we could present the entire page layout as a table, where content assets go into the cells. Much like you draw tables in Microsoft Word or in Macromedia Dreamweaver, you split the whole page area into arbitrary cells with horizontal and vertical lines. Then you drag-and-drop content assets into the cells, and they automatically take up the entire cell space. Afterwards, when you need to resize a column or a row, you just drag a table line. This is unlike widget-based editors, where you would need to resize and reposition each affected widget along the table line. Also, moving content assets between cells and swapping assets is much easier with the table-based editor. I want to test this idea. I have created a prototype application which you can download and play with: http://authorjet.com/news.php?item.2.1 I'd like to hear your comments. Is it going to speed up wireframing? What are the other pro and cons of this approach? -- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/An-Idea-about-Drawing-Wireframes-tp16024126p16024126.html Sent from the ixda.org - discussion list mailing list archive at Nabble.com. ________________________________________________________________ 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
