Develop a design project for a personal or corporate website in a visual editing environment before actually programming it. Select a template and customize it according to the specification of the site's purpose. View the design as a mock-up, check and adjust conditional logic, dynamic content, animations, math functions, data interactions, etc. Export the design for development.
Axure RP is intended to help developers design interactive web pages and websites without needing to write the underlying code. The tool has the complexity inherent to web design and the results will logically depend on your graphic design skills. Luckily, there is a tour file to let you know what the program can do. However, it would have been nicer to have more templates at hand.
The program has a modern interface, with a large tabbed working area in the center and panels at both sides. You can easily create new pages and specify their sizes if you expect to create a responsive website. In this respect, there are presets for various types of devices. Then, you can start adding elements to your pages. It is a good idea to base your design on the use of placeholders, tables and boxes. There is a library that contains most of the elements you need to create a web page, including various types of labels, ellipses, images, buttons, dropdown lists, etc. Just like other similar tools, dragging and dropping elements onto the canvas is the easiest way to populate your page.
A great advantage of this tool is the possibility of adding interactions of various types. Just by right-clicking on an object, you can add style effects. In this regard, you can set such parameters as color, fonts, borders, etc. Likewise, you can assign events, such as following a hyperlink to a different page.
Axure RP has a WYSIWYG editor, which gives an idea of what the page will look like. Yet, you can preview it in a browser. For this purpose, the program runs a local server to keep all the interaction going.
The resulting site can be shared in various ways. Probably, the most widely used of these methods is to generate HTML code and store it on a local folder. Unfortunately, this does not work properly with Google Chrome without a specific extension. Another possibility is to publish the site to Axure servers or any other server that you choose. Besides, it is quite useful to generate Word specifications.
All in all, Axure RP lets you create modern-looking web pages with lots of interaction. Unlike other similar tools that come with predefined styles, this one gives you plenty of freedom to design your pages. Moreover, it facilitates concentrating on the design part without worrying about the code beneath. The product is available in two licenses, Pro and Team. If you need to work with others, the Axure RP 9 Team is the best decision, as it allows co-authoring, revision histories and team project hosting on the developer’s servers. Fortunately, you may apply for a free license if you intend to use the product for educational purposes.
v8.0 [Apr 18, 2016]
FASTER DIAGRAMMING
Simplified Environment
New Inspector for editing interactions, notes, and style
Redesigned toolbars—Consistent across PC and Mac
Simplified toolbars across all panes
Widget Libraries
Default library has more styled shapes for quick wireframing and markup
New Icons library based on Font Awesome
Widget Styles
Simplified style system to use a single default style
Widgets in built-in libraries are all assigned a style
Styles can be easily added and updated from the Inspector
Pen Tool and Custom Shapes
New pen tool for drawing custom shapes and icons
Shape widgets can be converted to custom shapes
Transform custom shapes with flip, unite, subtract, intersect, and exclude operations
Flow Diagrams
All shape, image, and snapshot widgets have connector points
Connector points are visible only when using the connector tool and your mouse is over the widget
Connector points are larger and easier to select
Add, remove, and move connector points
24 new line ends
Straight and curved connector styles
BETTER SPECS
Notes
Change font, typeface and text color for Widget Notes
Filter by footnotes in the Outline
Widget Notes are presented in the new HTML sidebar
Text formatted as links in the notes are clickable in the HTML
Snapshot Widget
Capture an image of a page or master in a widget
Scale and adjust the offset of the image
Apply actions on the referenced page to change the image
Print Options
Set paper size and settings for a file
Show print guides on the canvas
Multiple print configurations
Additional scaling options in configurations
Page and master selection in configurations
ENHANCED PROTOTYPING
HTML Sidebar
New look and layout
New Console — See triggered interactions and variables as you navigate
Actions and Animations
New Rotate action to rotate widgets around a point with animation
New Set Opacity action
Set Size can be applied to shapes, images, hot spots, and form widgets and has anchor options
New Set Adaptive View action
New Fire Event action to trigger an event on a widget or page
Boundaries for Move action
Apply simultaneous animations on a widget
Flip animation when setting a panel state
Events
OnLoad available on all widgets
OnRotate added to shapes, images, and hot spots
OnSelectedChange, OnSelected, OnUnSelected added to shapes, images, hot spots, checkboxes, radio buttons, and trees
OnResize added to dynamic panels, shapes, images, hot spots, and form widgets
OnItemResize added to repeaters
Groups
Add interactions to groups
Apply actions to groups
Groups are listed in the Outline pane
Repeaters
"Fit to content in HTML" setting for varying item sizes
Hidden widgets no longer affect the bounds on an item
Faster initialization of repeaters in prototype
Form Fields
Hint text on text fields and text areas can be hidden after focus or after typing
Adaptive Views
Adaptive views enabled on individual pages
Base View can be renamed and assigned dimensions
EASIER COLLABORATION
Team Projects
Host team projects on Axure Share
Email notifications for team project actions on Axure Share
Create widget libraries as team projects
Edit styles, variables, and note fields without checking out
Widget Libraries
Publish widget libraries to Axure Share
Load libraries from Axure Share
Host library team projects on Axure Share
Axure Share Enterprise
Host Axure Share on your own servers and behind the firewall. Administrators can assign different levels of access to user accounts.
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