(2010-11-17) How Maurya Buids Prototypes

Ash Maurya explains hows he builds a ProtoType. He goes straight to building in his production technology (Ruby On Rails)! (He uses a Feature Toggle to hide it from real people.)

• Controller: If this is a brand new app, I need to build a skeleton app first. I define placeholders for all the views (pages) and wire them together for optimal navigation. This part is a snap in Ruby on Rails using controllers and routes. If this is an existing app, I need to decide where to inject the new screen and update the navigation flow accordingly.

• View: I will then pick the “most impact-full” view(s) and start designing those. I might do a paper sketch first if it’s particularly complicated... At this point, the mockup is ready for customer testing. (He has used static/fake but realistic data.)

• Model: Only after a mockup has passed initial customer testing and got the “green light” to move forward, will I revisit the model and replace the hard-coded HTML for a real data model (e.g. database table) and fully functioning code.