Prototyping Tools and Techniques

We begin with our definition of a prototype and then discuss prototypes as design artifacts, introducing four dimensions for analyzing them. We then discuss the role of prototyping within the design process, in particular the concept of a design space, and how it is expanded and contracted by generating and selecting design ideas. The next three sections describe specific prototyping approaches: Rapid prototyping, both off-line and on-line, for early stages of design, iterative prototyping, which uses on-line development tools, and evolutionary prototyping, which must be based on a sound software architecture.