JustProto has made some improvements over the last little while as they moved on to version 2.0 of their web based prototyping app. This time around they included a bunch of collaboration features. This means that the tool now allows multiple designers to work on one prototype simultaneously in real time. More so, designers can also create a quick preview links of the prototype that can be shared with the team. What’s interesting and unique though is that the shared prototype also updates instantaneously as users continue to work on it – potentially handy for quick feedback. Furthermore, real time chat as well as comments in the form of tags, sticky notes and pins have also been included.

Additionally, the latest version also now includes a prepackaged range of useful famfam icons as well as an extended set of elements. Another improvement is that now users can create their own custom reusable components – a pretty standard and useful feature.

Along with their new site redesign, the team has also exposed a number of public prototypes examples to give people a better sense of what is possible with their software.

The Giveaway. Yup, you heard it. These guys are giving away 3 One Year Plus Licenses. What do you need to do? Sign up for an account and leave a comment here on this blog of what you think is useful or would do to improve the tool. The JustProto team is eager to hear out some feedback. Myself along with the JustProto team will try to select the three commentators within 7 days.

Update Congrats to Ben, Michael, and Antonio! They have been selected for the giveaway. :)

Proto.io is a new UI prototyping tool specifically tailored for mobile and tablet applications. The web based environment allows you to start off by creating a project for either the iPad or the iPhone. After creating a few screens, you typically would expect to be able to link a few pages together with interactivity – and proto.io does just that. It comes prepackaged with actions that are custom to hand held devices. So for example, you can simulate such interactivty as: clicks, taps, tap and holds, as well as swipes. Additionally, transitions such as slides, pops, fades and flips are also supported to make the prototype resemble the real experience more closely. Pretty cool.

Proto.io also comes with other more standard prototyping features. Users can create reusable templates and components into which a bunch of prepackaged and editable elements can be dragged onto. Just to give you a taste, have a look at the Picker Component demo which is fully customizable. Another interesting draggable component includes the HTML Code box that allows users to write custom HTML. The tool also has a useful snappy grid as well as some align to features for those who wish to work at a pixel perfect level. Once the prototype is ready you can of course publish and preview your prototype which works inside a browser as well as real devices.

The team is apparently also working on supporting Android devices in the near future. Rock on. :)

Try it out.

Credits: Alexis Piperides