Ask HN: Actionable guide for turning ideas into interactive prototypes?

2 points

12 years ago

I used to really suck at getting that awesome idea from inside of my head to something other people can play around with (interactive prototypes).

If you follow tech news at all, you might have heard about a lot of cool apps that help people create prototypes, to list a few:

For programmers

- [Bootstrap](http://getbootstrap.com/)

- [Foundation](http://foundation.zurb.com/)

- [Pure](http://purecss.io/)

- [Gumby](http://gumbyframework.com/)

- [Skeleton](http://www.getskeleton.com/)

For non-programmers

- [Marvel App](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/marvel-app/id765801658) (really simple)

- [Flinto](https://www.flinto.com/)

- [Invision](http://www.invisionapp.com/)

- [Axure](http://www.axure.com/) (quite popular and very feature-rich)

- [Keynotopia for Keynote](http://keynotopia.com/)

- [OmniGraffle](http://www.omnigroup.com/)

The sad thing is I sucked at sketching! Without sketches, those tools couldn't do much to help me at all.

After a lot of failed attempts and (finally) some successful projects, I've come to realize that what I needed back then was a system or an actionable process as opposed to better tools that make things pretty and smooth.

I'm thinking about sharing what worked for me with other people, but I'm not sure if other people have the same problem I used to have.

So my questions to you are:

1. Do you struggle with turning ideas into something people can play with and base their feedback on?

2. If yes, what do you think is stopping you from achieving that?

3. What have you tried to tackle this problem?

Your thoughts will be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

P.S. I don't really understand how to use Markdown in an HN post.. so I'm sorry if this hurts your eyes.