Mark-Up

Until I heard about Axure last week I didn’t know about any tools out there for creating prototypes. But in the last week, I’ve learn the names of two others. The list I’m keeping currently includes:

• irise.com
• Axure.com
• Serena Composer

How did I miss all these before? Please leave a comment if you think there are others that should be added.

I have not spent much time looking at each of these. From what I have seen so far they offer high-fidelity prototypes to make sure that the sponsors/potential users understand how the application will work, look and feel.

I am very curious to see how well it generates code. The other side of the protokit benefit is that developers can also see an authentic design. Ideally, a high-fidelity prototype should look real both on the screen and under the hood. Developers should see all of the presentation assets (images and css) and exactly what mark-up their code (jsp, asp, php, etc.) should generate.

If you’ve had experience with any of these tools (or have examples online that they generated) please leave a comment below. I’m very interested to look at the output.

Ironically, these packages also automatically generate all the document debts that high-fidelity prototypes help eliminate the need for.