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Charles W. Stanton replied on November 05, 2008 17:24 to the discussion "OLD: Should I be selling Mockups For Desktop?" in Balsamiq:
I'm going to agree with the comment made by Miggl. The product is absolutely worth $79--if I'm using it at work. Anybody that works for a company that needs a tool to do GUI mockups should easily be able to justify spending $79 on this tool. As Peldi suggests, how much of your time is it giving back to you?
At the same time, if I were using this for myself and NOT asking the company to pay for it, I'd think twice before spending $79. $49 would be easier, and $29 puts it in the "no-brainer" category for a personal purchase.
So, who's the target audience? Where do you make the money? What's the price point that brings in a real crowd? These are all the classic software company questions, and I think Peldi's off to a great start.-
Charles W. Stanton replied on October 30, 2008 18:22 to the idea "Controlled size adjustments" in Balsamiq:
If you edit the position/size and hit "Enter" on any object that has text, you immediately end up in text editing mode. -
Charles W. Stanton replied on October 30, 2008 16:50 to the idea "Controlled size adjustments" in Balsamiq:
Peldi,
That rocks! I think people will quickly get turned on to using that little box.
- Charles -
A comment on the idea "Controlled size adjustments" in Balsamiq:
As for specifying size/position, it would just be handy on occasion. My biggest use case for putting in specific sizes would be images. My biggest use case for specific placement is in placing a container-type object on the same place from one mockup to the next. (Like putting the "app" box into the overall web page across different pieces of the "app.") – Charles W. Stanton, on October 29, 2008 17:54 -
A comment on the idea "Controlled size adjustments" in Balsamiq:
The arrow keys (with modifiers) would be great! Just didn't know if there were other uses for those combinations in mind... – Charles W. Stanton, on October 29, 2008 17:40 -
Charles W. Stanton made a comment on "Controlled size adjustments", but it was removed. see the change log
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Charles W. Stanton replied on October 29, 2008 17:23 to the idea "Controlled size adjustments" in Balsamiq:
It's certainly better than nothing, but here's my use case: I tend to do a lot of GUI brainstorming when I'm away from the office: sitting in Starbucks, or sitting on my couch, for instance. That means I'm NOT using a mouse, and I AM using this blasted touch pad on the laptop. Try doing ANYTHING "fine" with a touch pad. --groan--
No, I'm just suggesting that for those of us with poor fine-motor skills, a keyboard method would be really handy. -
Charles W. Stanton shared an idea in Balsamiq on October 29, 2008 15:54:
Controlled size adjustmentsTo facilitate precise placement of an object, we presently have the ability to use the arrow keys to bump it in any of the four directions by two pixels at a time. I'd like that same sort of functionality for resizing.
I'm thinking that using the number key pad would be perfect. If I hit #8, the top bar expands upward (perhaps by two pixels again). If I hit Shift-#8, the top bar contracts downward. #2 would make the bottom bar move, #4 the left bar, and #6 the right bar. (If you wanted to get crazy, you could use #1, #3, #7, and #9 to make an object expand/contract in two directions at once!)
While making these fine adjustments, I would like to see the size displayed, just like when I'm dragging the bars with the pointer.
Also, as mentioned in a previous post, the ability to type in specific dimensions for an object would be great. Further, I'd like the ability to type in a precise X, Y position for the top left corner.
Thanks for a terrific product! -
Charles W. Stanton shared an idea in Balsamiq on October 28, 2008 17:26:
Paste in original positionA small feature that I would appreciate is the ability to "paste in original position." At present, if I cut from one mockup and paste into another, the pasted object is shifted to coordinates offset by x+10, y+10. (And each subsequent paste adds another 10!) I'd love the simple little feature to paste exactly in the original place, with an associated keyboard shortcut of ctrl-alt-v or maybe ctrl-shift-v. Thanks! :-) -
Charles W. Stanton replied on October 27, 2008 21:06 to the praise "Balsamiq Mockups (Desktop) is the best GUI design tool ever!" in Balsamiq:
It didn't occur to me to look for another "praise" thread and jump in on it.
Given the nature of this "Get Satisfaction" tool, and given the potential long run of many, many Balsamiq Mockups users, it seems to me to be advantageous to have more "praise" threads than to have more people participating in fewer "praise" threads. Wouldn't you want to find a product that claimed "172 people have praised this product?" -
Charles W. Stanton started following the idea "Formatting of paragraph text" in Balsamiq.
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Charles W. Stanton gave praise in Balsamiq on October 27, 2008 18:51:
Balsamiq Mockups (Desktop) is the best GUI design tool ever!As the requirements gatherer/designer/lead coder, my GUI designs serve two purposes: 1) To brainstorm and build ideas with the user community; 2) To communicate to the other developers the very ideas agreed upon by the user community.
In the past, the only two tools I've ever had any comfort with were whiteboards and Power Point. Whiteboards make it super easy to draw and change ideas, but they look pretty poor and they aren't very durable or portable. (I'd taken to keeping a digital camera in my desk.) Power Point can make a mock-up look spot-on, but it takes forever to do, and it can't always be coded exactly like the "picture." (We've joked about the wonders we've accomplished in the "Power Point Operating System.")
Enter Balsamiq Mockups. It's arguably easier to use than a whiteboard. (Try creating a tab panel on a whiteboard in as few seconds as you can do it in Mockups!). It creates durable, editable mock-ups. (Try editing that digital picture you took of the whiteboard.) And with the PNG export, it offers terrific portability.
Before, I was doing far too little GUI "prototyping" because either the results weren't reusable or the effort took to long; now I fear I may be doing too much because it's just that much fun. -
Charles W. Stanton replied on October 27, 2008 18:30 to the idea "Allow one mockup to serve as a background layer for other mockups." in Balsamiq:
It is very much what I have in mind. (You'll notice I did reference your thread; however, I wasn't thinking enough to actually link to it.)
In the first thread, however, Peldi posed some questions, and you posed some ideas, and I wanted to sort of "subclass" your thread with one that says, "Yeah, give me the easiest possible implementation," or something like that.
Also, the original thread was presented as a question, not as an idea, so people can't "vote" on it like they can for an idea. -
Charles W. Stanton shared an idea in Balsamiq on October 27, 2008 17:43:
Allow one mockup to serve as a background layer for other mockups.If I could create a mockup, then use it as a locked background layer for another mockup, it would be a tremendous help during the iterative design process.
In designing a web application, I'd start with a layer that had only the banner/header. On top of that I'd build a layer that added the left menu bar. On top of that I'd build a layer with the application framework. On top of that, I'd take a crack at some data-specific shots.
After I end up with about 15 "tabs" of the application done, and the marketing person says, "Can we rename that item in the left-hand menu?" I don't want to go change 15 mockups!
So, this is somewhat similar to the "Insert a mockup by reference" thread; however, this is a vote that I would happily accept the limitation of it being "locked" and always being the absolute back-most layer. I think many others would find very creative ways to use this as well.
Here are a couple base layers leading up to a couple "application layout" shots:
