TINK - sketching product experiences of connected objects

84 - TINK
5.1 Prototyping TINK
The design phase was followed by a
prototyping phase aimed at the realization
of an experiential prototype for testing
purposes.
Considering the limited amount of time,
it was decided to directly go in the
implementation of a digital working
version of the platform without doing any
test with paper prototypes.
A digital working prototype was also
preferred as it would provoke as much
insight as possible on the design. Users
in front of a paper prototype understand
the sketchiness of the artefact and tend
to be less detailed in the feedback they
provide. Moreover, as one of the goals of
the user test is to determine how much this
platform support the sketching of complex
systems, it will be difficult to determine
this from a low fidelity prototype that is
sketchy by definition.
the idea proposed.
Figure 38 shows the technologies that
where experimented and tested during the
implementation of the two prototypes.
The picture highlights how the different
technologies were used to developed
different parts of the prototype. Because
of time constraints, the technologies were
not combined in a single platform, and two
different prototypes where developed:
• The first prototype was built
to challenge the difficulties of
connecting an Arduino to the Internet
via web-sockets;
• The second one was mainly concerned
with the implementation of the
platform’s user interface for the
purposes of the user test.
It was decided to prototype the platform
using a full stack of current web
technologies. This might not be the
most reasonable choice from a design
perspective, as it might cost a lot of time
to develop. However, the decision was
taken in order for the designer to learn
and get familiar with new technologies
that are becoming quite common in the
field of interaction design. Additionally,
developing a prototype using real web
technologies provided opportunities for
the designer to reflect on the feasibility of