

Ask HN: Review our brand spanking new web designer mockup tool, Clickdummy.com - jqueryin

https://clickdummy.com<p>We'd love any and all feedback on our newly launched (not quite yet SaaS) application to help web design firms, freelancers, and UI designers alike speed up the process of prototyping with client feedback. There's a number of tools in the market, but we would like to thing we have a unique take on the problem at hand and some elegant and useful solutions. Here's the gist of the app:<p>"A 'clickdummy' is a mockup, evolved. Dummies let users navigate your mockups as if they were live websites or applications. Simply upload mockups you've created offline and draw clickable areas to let users navigate between them. The result is a very convincing simulation that does a much better job of communicating user experience than mockups alone."<p>Here's a blog post a fellow employee created regarding the difficulties of building the app in node.js:<p>http://skookum.com/blog/building-a-non-trivial-app-in-node-js/<p>There's been a ton of man hours spread across five buddies to get this thing out the door in 4 months. The whole project was bootstrapped and our team resides in Charlotte, NC.<p>We'd love any and all feedback you can give us.  Feel free to either reply here or if you find a glaring issue, please <i>please</i> don't hesitate to add it to our Zendesk account at http://help.skookum.com/
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Undergrads
I think that the application itself has a lot of potential; however, there are
two things that distract me from the actual content. Although I find the
design agreeable, I feel as though the color scheme is reminiscent of
security, perhaps Norton AntiVirus even. Although this could be seen as a
positive, I think it is too much business/professional given the concept and
would benefit from a more design/art feel. Additionally, I agree with mryan
that the name does not do the application justice and quite possibly gives the
wrong impression to potential users. Below are some available domain names I
just brainstormed if you are interested. I am not suggesting that these are
necessarily any better, just offering some suggestions. I hope that this does
not come off as too negative, as I am honestly impressed by the application
thus far. Nice work.

clickrelease.com

clicklayers.com

clickskinned.com

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mryan
My first impression is that the name is bad. If I was working with a web
designer and they asked me to use "clickdummy" to collaborate, I would wonder
who the "dummy" is supposed to be. Although you go on to explain what dummies
are in the FAQ, the damage would have already been done by then. The first
time I read the phrase, I assumed it was an instruction - "click [on this],
dummy!".

Perhaps I am being overly-sensitive on the naming issue, but it seems that
using what can be a pejorative term as part of your company name could
backfire.

The home page took 25+ seconds to load - hopefully this is because lots of
other HNers are currently checking it out.

I do like the idea overall, and the site design is nice and understated.

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herman
Sounds pretty cool. Are there any examples that you can share? I'm sure a lot
of people would like to see a working demo/example before signing up.

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jqueryin
Here's a publicly shared url for you of a Hacker News mockup. Hover over the
HN navigation on any of the pages and click through for testing.

[https://clickdummy.com/shared/E883012B-5B89-4AA3-AB7B-1FB1A9...](https://clickdummy.com/shared/E883012B-5B89-4AA3-AB7B-1FB1A901FC03)

~~~
herman
I like it. Will definitely be using it for my next project.

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Epenthesis
Is it really necessary for me to create an account before trying it?

This is really a more general point, but why do more sites not use
StackOverflow's system, wherein you can use the site provisionally, with your
identity being tracked by a cookie, and the user can choose to convert to
something with a bit more persistence later.

~~~
jqueryin
This problem will be addressed in an upcoming release with live demo
functionality so you can get accustomed to the application and determine if it
suits your needs. Thanks for the feedback!

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taphangum
My advice would be to further explain the 'add pages' concept. It confused me.

Another little gripe is the lack of an instruction video. It'd help.

(Just spend about 6 minutes on the site)

~~~
jqueryin
Thanks for the feedback. We're definitely looking to improve the user
experience wherever possible. A video is something we've been looking into
post-launch.

------
taphangum
clickable: <https://clickdummy.com>

