Code: Tools

Picture this: You’re starting a new app-design project, and instead of initially staring at a blank screen, you have AI tools at your behest that can generate wireframes that are tailored to your project’s requirements. These layouts aren’t random—they’re based on your users’ data, tailored to users’ preferences, and aligned with what’s working within your industry domain right now. Throughout your design process, an AI can suggest real-time tweaks that are based on user-behavior patterns, helping you refine a product’s design at lightning speed.

This isn’t some distant future—it’s happening now. AI is fast becoming a UX designer’s best teammate, helping us work faster, think smarter, and create more meaningful user experiences. Read More

The right tool makes all the difference in UX and user-interface (UI) design. With hundreds of tools available on the market, selecting the right ones to meet your needs can be challenging. Here’s a look at the top 20 essential tools for UX designers, along with their strengths and drawbacks.

My Framework for Evaluation

I’ll analyze these tools based on five main criteria:

1. Functionality—Core features and capabilities
2. Ease of use—How easy the tool is for new users to learn and use
3. Collaboration features—How well the tool supports team collaboration
4. Integrations—The tool’s compatibility with other tools
5. Value for money—Free or paid—and whether the features justify the price

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AI-powered user-story generators present a very interesting use case for large language models (LLMs). These applications can assist in the creation of user stories, an essential task in agile development and product management.

I’ve tested a few of them and used Stories on Board, Cookup.AI, Easy-Peasy.AI, and a tool that IBM Consulting has developed, IBM Assistant, to assess the quality of their output in two very different scenarios, as follows:

• Scenario 1—An online application helps strategists create value-chain diagrams for client companies. A value chain is an artifact that strategists use to visualize activities that are strategically relevant to a business and the links between them. This is a useful strategic-management tool that helps give a fuller picture of an organization’s cost drivers and sources of differentiation.
• Scenario 2—A mobile app supports and encourages bike usage within a small metropolitan area. I looked at this scenario further by considering a variant: an app that supports and encourages bike usage within the small French city of Montpellier. Read More