Information System Management-Prototyping Prototyping Journal

Information System Management-Prototyping

Prototyping

Journal of Systems Management. An investigation of guidelines for selecting a prototyping strategy. By Rick, W., & Bill, H.

Prototypes are employed within the organizations to help the system designers in building an information system which is intuitive and easy for manipulation for the end users. It is an interactive process that involves analysis phase of the systems development life cycle. In a nutshell, prototyping is the process used to build a model of a system (Rick & Bill, 1994). This paper will review the above mentioned article giving a brief description of the purpose of prototyping as well as describing one thing that surprised me the most about prototyping.

Prototypes are used as part of a process in product design so as to allow the designers the ability of exploring the designing alternatives. The designers use their experience in tailoring the prototype according to unknowns present in the intended design. For instance some of the prototypes may be used in confirming and verifying the interest of the consumers in the proposed design while others will only attempt in verifying the performance of the design approach. Prototyping is significant to designers because it enables them to try out their ideas with the users in order to gather the feedback.

Purpose of prototyping

From the article, the main purpose of prototyping is to give guidelines to the users on how to select a prototyping strategy or techniques when implementing their systems. Guidelines for prototyping allow the users with the testing design ideas as well as gathering feedback at the early stages of the development, hence reducing time and cost for developing the system.

Prototyping provides the most efficient and effective way of refining and optimizing the interfaces through exploration and testing. However early evaluation is usually based on a faster and cheaper prototypes before one starts a full implementation. This allows the user to understand the interface design and how it has been achieved with the designers and the users.

What surprised me about Prototyping in the article

Although the prototyping systems are presently becoming smaller and more affordable, they are still present additional expenses for most companies. There are some companies who select a prototyping strategy that is much cheaper than other systems. In the article, there are two main things that surprised me about prototyping.

One thing is that, not all prototypes implemented looks accurate. Most companies use prototyping in printing parts for their functional testing in prior to production. However despite of the advancement in technology, various prototyping systems cannot manage to create the design. However, prototyping is said to be a non- remedy for the problems that are associated with the system development.