Goodbye, Waterfall

In the running debate over iterative vs. waterfall software development, the promise of using declarative UI markup languages and tools to help minimize churn and waste in the design ideation process, while at the same time eliminating “lossiness” in the translation of visual and interaction design to development, has been a standard pointer for the proponents of iterative process methodologies (think XP, Agile, Scrum, ...) for quite a while.

I am a proponent of the 80-20 rule, especially in creating user experiences with rich interactive platform technologies. 80% of an agile-like process so that designs don't get dumped over a wall to technologists left to fend for themselves and with a healthy amount of flexibility to adapt to changing business requirements or market conditions. 20% of a managed linear process so that it doesn't turn into a free-for-all with too many cooks in the kitchen and leading to difficulty tracking major milestones and ROI.

A new whitepaper from Microsoft evangelists Karsten Januszewski and Jaime Rodriguez explores the premise of how the new Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) UI platform and tools, specifically the XAML declarative markup language to express design visuals and interactions, delivers on the promise of fluid collaboration and iteration between designers and technologists to ultimately envision and successfully execute on superior user experiences.

The New Iteration: How XAML Transforms the Collaboration Between Designers and Developers in Windows Presentation Foundation - Read Online or Download PDF

This paper is well organized and covers the important topics of roles, workflow, and best practices for both designers and developers with WPF and XAML in a collaborative process model. Designers and technologists from frog design contributed in part to the research for this paper based on experience with a design process and best practices we have invested in for several years since the early days of this platform (as "Avalon" in 2005).