[HN Gopher] Show HN: TinyUX - Grid based low-fi wireframing on y...
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Show HN: TinyUX - Grid based low-fi wireframing on your mobile
phone
You tap icons to create a wireframe, or do some visual
brainstorming. Then export the image to share on Slack, Gitlab,
etc. I wanted to work on neural net that interprets an imported
image of a wireframe, to then manipulate it inside an app. Figured
it would be best to first build the wireframing app. So I created
TinyUX. It's released as quickly as possible this influenced some
choices: - While created in React Native, it's Android only. -
It's paid only (~$5). While freemium might make more sense, this
was quicker to release, since in-app-purchases in RN is not
trivial. First app I created that's not free, so that's an
experiment too. - There are no online features, all is stored on
the device. Looking to validate with UX designers, but all
feedback is welcome.
Author : juliushuijnk
Score : 91 points
Date : 2022-12-06 12:53 UTC (10 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.tinyux.app)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.tinyux.app)
| atomicnature wrote:
| Great stuff. We need more serious and sophisticated mobile apps.
| During the initial Brainstorming for handheld devices, the
| inventors had stuff like this in mind. It's a tool for authoring,
| not just consumption.
| rubymamis wrote:
| Is this GPT?
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Aren't we all?
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Yes!
| CyberDildonics wrote:
| Is wireframing newspeak for creating a user interface?
| rchaud wrote:
| I like the idea, reminds me of OmniGraffle from many years ago,
| mixed in with a bit of Excalidraw?
|
| Thanks for making an Android app, the platform is lacking in
| design tools in general. And props to you for making it a flat
| fee instead of the freemium-to-subscription pipeline that most
| other app businesses feel compelled to do.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Thanks!
|
| Gives me the opportunity to mention that the app does not will
| NEVER have ads. There will also always be a single-purchase
| version. The whole purpose of the tool is to help people create
| and be innovative. Being pushed ads in your face is the
| opposite.
|
| Although I do think the freemium-to-subscription also makes
| sense here. A free 'crippled' version to make it easier for
| people to taste before they buy.
|
| And for online features (currently the app is fully offline) I
| would need some sort of subscription to cover server costs.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Also thanks for the link to Excalidraw, didn't know that site.
| marban wrote:
| https://balsamiq.com/wireframes/
| robertlagrant wrote:
| Love Balsamiq.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Yes Balsamiq is nice. TinyUX is a mobile app, so unique in that
| sense. Also TinyUX is cheaper ($5). Price will get up once the
| app gains in features.
|
| Once there is traction adding online features, web- and desktop
| interfaces will also make sense.
| brainchild-adam wrote:
| Nice! Thank you for sharing.
|
| It's probably not something you'd want to prioritize, and you
| mentioned releasing it quickly influenced some of your decisions.
| But a way to pay outside of the PlayStore would be nice for those
| of us who chose to or cannot use it for payment.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Hi, I'm open to suggestions on how. On an alternative store or
| something like that?
|
| Google wont allow distribution via Google Play, and payment via
| third party I think.
| rchaud wrote:
| Do the Play Store rules allow you to post an APK with a
| license key on Gumroad or Shopify or some other provider?
| specialist wrote:
| This is just terrific.
|
| --
|
| Old man shouting at clouds...
|
| I learned how to do low-fidelity paper prototyping from Luke
| Hohmann at OOPSLA 1998 in Vancouver.
| https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2017112.Oopsla_98
|
| Just like this:
|
| "Lo-fi Paper Prototype Example"
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRlcZJpl0dw
|
| I can't quickly find Luke's paper online. IIRC, this book is
| pretty terrific:
|
| "Paper Prototyping: The Fast and Easy Way to Design and Refine
| User Interfaces" [2004]
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/book/9781558608702/paper-proto...
|
| Here's the thing. I have near religious devotion to lo-fi
| prototyping. I really thought it'd become the norm.
|
| Back then, I envisioned UIs would be developed like:
| All the requirements gathering and analysis. User profiles, use
| cases, creative writing, story boards. Then convert
| story boards into paper prototypes. Then validate
| paper prototypes with users. Usability testing where the devs
| pretend to be the computer. Iterate.
| Then convert paper prototypes into code mockups. More usability
| testing. Iterate. Then convert mockups
| into an app.
|
| For this to work, be practical, the cost of change has to be
| dramatically reduced. To do that, there needs to be a workflow
| that connects paper to mockups to app.
|
| In my future perfect world, TinyUX (Balsamiq, Figma, etc) must
| first ingest paper prototypes and generate code. Something
| declarative, like SwingUI. Just enough meat and bones to hand off
| to devs. Who can then flesh it out or reimplement it.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Yes, the plan is to let it import pictures of paper prototypes,
| use a neural net to interpret it and translate it to ux-source
| code. Then you can manipulate it and output it to other tools &
| platforms.
|
| Did some early experiments a while back, and have quite some
| time in December, so hope to make some progress to this end.
|
| Tweets about the Neural Net experiments:
|
| - https://twitter.com/Juliu/status/1548691577677152257 -
| https://twitter.com/Juliu/status/1549425680718467079
|
| One of the challenges is that the grid size is not known in
| advance.
|
| Going to watch all the Karpathy videos and hope to figure it
| out.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Perhaps a Large Language Model (LLM) can translate my .ux
| source code to all the different platforms for me.. So many
| ideas, so little time!
| devmor wrote:
| Oh hey, this is actually nice and fills a niche that I can use -
| on-the-fly layout prototyping with clients.
|
| If it was available on iPad, I'd pay $5 for it personally, $10 if
| it could export UML or some kind of XML definition.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Hi, planning to do iOS release next year. It's built in React
| Native, so should be easy in theory, only thing is that don't
| have a have personal OSX laptop (required for publishing) nor
| Apple developer account at the moment.
|
| Your not the first to ask for it, so I guess I'll have to
| figure it out.
|
| > $10 if it could export UML or some kind of XML definition
|
| Interesting. One of the features I plan to work on this week is
| export & import of source files. My first plan is to 'brute
| force' it, and export a .json file with a attributes for each
| cell in the grid. But could also be yml, or even XML I guess.
| WrtCdEvrydy wrote:
| > that don't have a have personal OSX laptop (required for
| publishing) nor Apple developer account at the moment.
|
| So you don't need a developer account for development. If you
| use the same icloud account that's on the phone (I use an
| iPhone SE original edition), you can login to XCode and
| deploy your app to your phone for 7 days I believe. Great for
| development.
|
| You're SOL on the Macbook though, ask around, maybe you have
| a buddy that can loan you one (or get a cheapo used macbook
| air with a busted display or something)
| alistairclark7 wrote:
| Last time I made a react native app I used
| https://www.macincloud.com/ to publish on iOS. I'm not
| affiliated and haven't used them in about 3 years though. It
| was a little bit of hassle but cheaper than buying a mac in
| the short term.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| My wife is buying a new laptop, hope to be able to nudge
| her in the direction of Macbook Air.
|
| I do actually have one in my possession for day-job, but
| don't want to mix private projects on that laptop.
| devmor wrote:
| Used mac minis are your friend when it comes to having an
| Apple box just to build releases!
|
| The reason I mentioned UML/XML are because those are the
| languages used by most popular wireframing apps for cross
| compatibility - if you do decide to add that feature, I would
| look into how they implement it specifically and it will
| probably save you a lot of work too!
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Thanks for the tips.
|
| Thinking about creating an open source repo for a script
| that will turn my export json in any other sort of file-
| format.
|
| Wrote an articla in 2017 about the need for universal .ux
| files. https://medium.com/proof-of-concept/creating-a-true-
| ux-tool-...
|
| But have to do some more re-thinking on the specifics.
| bgorman wrote:
| You need to get an iOS app out yesterday. The UX/design world is
| filled with Apple loyalists.
| juliushuijnk wrote:
| Yes.
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