Page 13 of 13
Task 3: Documenting design decisions
In this task you will be planning the methods you would use to create a design history file and creating tools to do this. This relates to our section on documenting design decisions.
Step-by-step
- As a group, map out the process of making a decision about a feature that your product might have, with all the steps you would take along the way. For example. It might look something like this:
- You have a working prototype of an app that you want to test with users
- You carry out a test and gather data by observing participants using the app
- The data shows that participants are struggling to understand how to navigate around the app
- You decide to change the navigation and design a new structure. It might be easier to do this on post it notes or a large sheet of paper so that you can move things around and add to it.
- For each stage, make a note of where these would be recorded. Would this already be part of your process? Or do you need to create new tools to record some or all of this information?
- If you need to create new tools, identify what they would need to do, and how they would be part of your workflow.
- If you have time, draft these new tools and then fill in all the documentation needed to track one full cycle of a decision.
- As a group, reflect on the following questions: How did these tools work for you in practice? What would be the challenges with recording this level of detail? How would you ensure that it happens? Would it be clear to an auditor who needed to trace all your design decisions back through time?