Prototyping in Axure
For a recent project at work some of the team have been using Axure to design our wireframes. Not only that we’ve been using its snazzy prototyping features to build interactive prototypes. It’s a hot topic of discussion at LBi around which software we choose to use for our wireframes. Personally, I’m still learning, so I don’t really have a preference to any one program. But having used Axure for a few days now, I’m starting to see why more Experience Architects (EA’s) are using it.
For the team, we wanted something that was good for teamwork. Using Axure’s collaboration feature called ‘Shared projects‘ we were quickly and easily able to set up a project environment where we could build our wireframes within one area and not lots of separate files all over the place. Using Axure we can also add interactive elements to our wireframes such as clickable buttons, tabs, overlays, popups, error states and more. For the client, they get to see more than just static wireframes, they get to see a working prototype that is closer to the real thing compared to conventional wireframes.
So, those are some of the positives. What are the drawbacks? In Axure’s latest release – Axure 5. I was expecting a more comprehensive set of widgets. The widgets are elements you use to build your pages e.g. lines, text fields, radio buttons etc. But in Axure 5 you have a limited set of widgets, which is slightly annoying. So, you’re stuck with having to draw your element whatever that maybe in another program and then copying and pasting it into Axure. Also, as Axure is bitmap-based your ‘pasted-in’ elements cannot be manipulated. In essence, it’s not the drawing tool it needs to be, but it creates realistic interactive prototypes. Let’s hope we get to see more widgets in Axure’s next release.