A Comparative Study of Milestones for Featuring GUI Prototyping Tools

TL;DR

This paper reviews the evolution of GUI prototyping tools from 1988 to present, analyzing academic and commercial tools to identify milestones, trends, and gaps for future research in HCI.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive comparative analysis of prototyping tools' features and evolution, highlighting key milestones and gaps in the field.

Findings

Identification of key milestones in prototyping tools evolution

Comparison of academic and commercial tool features

Insights into future research directions

Abstract

Prototyping is one of the core activities of User-Centered Design (UCD) processes and an integral component of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) research. For many years, prototyping was synonym of paper-based mockups and only more recently we can say that dedicated tools for supporting prototyping activities really reach the market. In this paper, we propose to analyze the evolution of prototyping tools for supporting the development process of interactive systems. For that, this paper presents a review of the literature. We analyze the tools proposed by academic community as a proof of concepts and/or support to research activities. Moreover, we also analyze prototyping tools that are available in the market. We report our observation in terms of features that appear over time and constitute milestones for understating the evolution of concerns related to the development and use of prototyping tools. This survey covers publications published since 1988 in some of the main HCI conferences and 118 commercial tools available on the web. The results enable a brief comparison of characteristics present in both academic and commercial tools, how they have evolved, and what are the gaps that can provide insights for future research and development.