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Wireframes are boundary objects. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_object http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_object That's the best explanation I've eve
by petervandijck 16y ago
Wireframes are boundary objects. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_object http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_object
That's the best explanation I've ever found. They're better than pretty designs or actual implementation at getting "different social groups" (think business, dev, design, ...) to create a shared understanding. A developer looks at a wire and sees something different than a businessguy, but they're still looking at the same document, which lets them communicate. They're communication enablers. They should be ugly and they should be throw-away documents.
- sgdesign 16y agoThat's a very good observation. I agree that they enable communication, but I just think in many cases other tools can be even better at that.
- petervandijck 16y agoSure. But designs generally are worse tools for communication with business people and devs than wireframes, unless you just want to talk about the design and nothing else.
- sgdesign 16y agoI don't see why they'd be worse tools. If you don't want people to focus on the design aspect at all, use something like a prioritized list of elements. And if you want to talk about design, then try to get as close to the real deal as possible (either with a photoshop mockup or a html prototype). But wireframes exist in a grey zone where people will discuss the placement of a call to action button or menu item, only without the benefit of visual guidelines like colors, contrast, typography, etc.