Jay Blanchard <mailto:jay.blanchard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> on Tuesday, March 22, 2005 4:47 AM said:
+1 for pencil & paper or whiteboard. And in the words of Obi Jay, "Use the flowchart Chris"
I would very much like to use flowcharts but I haven't been able to use them effectively yet. That is, I'm not sure how to split up the macro from the micro. Macro being the flow a user would take through the checkout section of the site and micro being how a function works.
+1 on pen and paper.
One approach that I liked (I forgot what book it was mentioned in) involves using a whiteboard and post-it notes.
You put your entities on the post it notes, then draw flow lines on the whiteboard. This way, you can easily move your entities around.
It really helps when ironing out workflow issues. For example, what happens when a user enters the wrong password in a login form? Easy to figure out by just moving around the sticky notes. Once you have your flow dailed down, then its just a matter of copying it on paper and finalizing it.
Keep in mind that flowcharts are "living" docs....if you need to make a change to the code somewhere down the line you can (and should) change the flowchart to reflect it.
That sticky-notes + whiteboard helps with dynamic flowcharting a lot.
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