RAD Prototyping

Architects begin with a sketch.

Based on their knowledge of a building’s inhabitants and purpose, they pencil in one room at a time; they experiment with the shapes and relationships among rooms, they change and move things around, add furnishings, fill in details, until in a short time an overall layout is revealed. The sketch is not the finished design, but a prototype for the design to come.

Organizations designing their Web site face a similar challenge. They know their audience, have a general idea of the content and features they want, but they have no way to sketch out the site and its three-dimensional structure, showing navigation, content, and hyperlinks. Until now.

“Rapid Content Development (RAD)”

Brook Group has introduced RAD prototyping, an advancement in easy to use Web site design and content development. Combining the process of prototyping with the power of Brook Group’s award-winning Tacklebox content management system, RAD allows Brook Group and its clients to quickly and easily organize content into a fully interactive Web site that provides a working prototype that can easily be changed and updated in real time. Brook Group clients can visualize not just how their site’s content will be organized, but their customers navigational experience as they flow from page to page on the site.

RAD allows Brook Group clients to gather content and visualize navigation at the same time, in rapid content development mode. Rather than relying on elaborate content lists and navigation diagrams that then must be translated into HTML, through RAD prototyping Web site owners can quickly and easily create a navigational structure and enter actual content through an easy to use word processor-like editing tool. The prototype site serves as the skeleton for the creative design that will be based on your real content.

Designed by information architects and usability experts, the interface is simple and intuitive, making the process smooth and providing a prototype in as few steps as possible. Content that is entered into the Tacklebox prototype site can be moved directly into the final site, whether it is a Tacklebox-driven site or an HTML site.

Tacklebox is a Java-based Web content management system. The RAD tool resides on National Security Agency-approved servers, and each RAD site is configured for a specific Brook Group client.