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Balsamiq Mockups: A kinder, gentler wireframing tool?
August 18th, 2011 @ 07:43pm
Wireframes: as architects we all need to develop them. The question revolves around what tool to use. There are many schools of thought on this which range from the paper and pencil/pen method all the way up to creating a working prototype in your development tool of choice. I’ve fallen victim to using all of these methods and usually end up somewhere in the middle and spending too much time throwing together a mock-up which has to be tweaked a bunch before it is approved anyway.
Enter Balsamiq Studios (http://balsamiq.com) with Balsamiq Mockups, their Rapid Wireframing tool. Mockups gives you one step above paper and pencil mockups without having to do real development work to get your wireframes built. It gives you the ability to easily put together “low-fi”, sketch-type screens and build rudimentary interactions between them.
Mockups comes with several pre-built elements to make your life easier. There are menus, icons, lists, grids, textboxes and many many more. The application includes elements for client applications, web applications, mobile devices and you can download more from users who’ve shared ones they’ve built themselves from Balsamiq’s MockUpsToGo (http://mockupstogo.net) site. The elements all work as you’d expect. For example when you create a menu, you can choose a “selected” item and when you preview the wireframe, that item is appropriately highlighted. The toolbox also includes various “markup” elements which allow you to put callouts, sticky notes, and other information on the mockups. These can be used as reminders to ask questions or to clarify uses of the other screen elements when demonstrating the wireframe.
Each mockup is a single screen and is saved in its own file. All of the screens associated with an application are saved in a single filesystem folder. Almost any element you place on a mockup has the ability to link to another mockup. Another nice feature is that you can create a blank mockup, or copy the one you’re currently working on and use that as the basis for a new one. This copy feature is invaluable when linking mockups together so you don’t have to rebuild a mockup from scratch.
Once you have your wireframed application, you can preview it and walk through the screens using the links you’ve defined.
The product operates on all the usual platforms, exports to PNG, PDF, or XML formats. The Export function will also export all of the mockups in a single folder in a one operation so that you don’t have to do each screen separately.
There are many more features that I’ve not touched on but, suffice it to say, Mockups is an excellent, rapid wireframing tool which we’ll use over and over again as the starting point for our prototyping needs for the foreseeable future. This tool has become one of my favorites for the first steps in generating new prototypes. Lastly, its tongue-in-cheek user interface is great for developers. How many applications have a choice on the “help” menu that says “What should I make for dinner?”
Download the free 7-day trial and if you like it, buy it for $79, that’s cheap for what you get!