An Alternative Prototyping Classification

During the past few years there has been an everincreasing awareness that a static paper description of a computer-based information system, however formally specified or rigorously defined, is far from adequate for communicating the dynamics of the situation. Much better to be able to illustrate this using a working model of the system. It is this working model, albeit crude and incomplete, but always speedily constructed, that is known as a prototype. Several articles exist which provide an introduction to prototyping, for example Brittan, and Dearnley and Mayhew. As more people became interested in the building and use of system prototypes, so the need for a structure in which to discuss them became apparent. Two such frameworks have been proposed, Floyd and Law, both of which are based on observations of the different types of prototyping currently being adopted. This paper provides an alternative prototyping classification based on the underlying components involved in the prototyping process. The proposed classification is founded in the potential for prototyping rather than in current practice. One important result of adopting this type of approach is that it offers the possibility to improve upon the vital activities of prototype planning and prototype evaluation.