Wireframing is a very powerful tool in building the foundation for a website. Wireframes allow your team to visually recognize the interactions between pages and content. There are many different ways of integrating wireframes in to your process and it might be different from project to project.
Some wireframes may be very low fidelity, where the focus is strictly the layout of content and where form and button features might appear. Other wireframes can be of great detail, at times referenced as prototypes, truly representing the interactions involved allowing team members and clients to actually see movement and interaction with form and button elements. Wireframe prototypes can also provide a hint at the design of the final website, but should not distract from understanding changes may and often times will need to be made based on issues with the interaction and/or experiences after testing. Wireframes are great for agile development and are meant to be rapidly produced and polished as you tweak with the interactions.
Integrating wireframes into your design process will provide a more stable direction into the final creative and technical end of the process, with confidence all interactions are accounted for and provide that consistency for a better user experience.
For further reading, Smashing Magazine has compiled a list of 35 Excellent Wireframing Resources to inspire you to adopt this very concept.
September 18th, 2009 at 10:02 am
Hi,
That is a great summary of a big article.
I think that to be able to iterate on a wireframe while in a meeting with client makes a wireframe so much more valuable as ideas get converted very quickly.
My tool http://www.Simulify.com helps one to quickly visualize Apps and share interactive wireframes online.
vikas
September 18th, 2009 at 10:19 am
Vikas, thanks for the feedback and the link to Simulify. There are a variety of wireframe tools online, how do we measure the tools overall performance? Or are the tools very much project to project based as well?