This is version 2 of the Better Defaults library, expanded to sixty five (or so) interactive and cleanly styled widgets. Use it in place of the standard widget set.

Reasons to use these widgets include:

• Consistent and improved styling.
• Polished interactivity.
• Standardized labeling.
• Expanded set of shapes & controls.
• Rollover, MouseDown, Selected, and Disabled styles for most controls.
• Includes all defaults.

This is for version 5.5 and above. Put the extracted .rplib file in your “My Documents\My Axure RP Libraries\” folder (Windows) or your “Documents\Axure\Libraries” folder (Mac).

Preview |  Download

1. Plan
   • Choose a central theme.
   • Make a list of widgets that will be included.
   • Determine a common style to use throughout the library. This may include color, grid, typography, interactivity, and copy.
2. Create
   • Open Axure RP.
   • In the widgets pane on the left, click the “Wireframe” dropdown and choose “Create library…”
   • Save the new document with a short, clear name—this will be the name that shows up in the library droplist for everyone.
   • Create each widget just like you would create new pages in a normal prototype.
3. Polish
   • Name everything that may be interactive. A dynamic panel for showing a calendar should be named something like “panel – calendar”. A submit button should be something like “button – submit”. This will help your users during annotation and spec generation.
   • Add Rollover, MouseDown, Selected, and Disabled states to interactive shapes like buttons. Right click the object > Edit Button Shape > Edit Rollover Style (etc).
   • Many widgets may contain more than one element. Group them together (ctrl + G) to ensure they don’t get separated when your users move them around.
   • Sort the widgets. This is difficult because you have to do it manually and there is no best sort order. Play around with sorting options, such as alphabetical vs. order or importance, to find what’s right for you. It’s worth the effort.
   • Add custom thumbnails. Another pain-in-the-butt task that will improve the professionalism of your library tenfold. Take your inner icon designer out for a spin and start producing 32 x 32 px thumbnails in .png format. Apply them to widgets by right clicking the Widget > “Widget Properties” > “Import Icon”. Make liberal use of screen grabs. Even your lamest effort at producing an icon will look better than the grainy compressed default that Axure spits out.
   • Add descriptions. I don’t always do this, but for complex widgets, it can be good to explain them a bit. Right click the Widget > “Widget Properties”. Put your description in the text area.
4. Distribute
   • Hosting .rp / .rplib files is fraught with issues due to their resemblance to .zip files. There is one true method for hosting these things successfully (take my word for it): Put the .rp / .rplib file(s) in a folder, and zip the folder. This is the file you distribute.
5. Announce
   • The best places to announce Axure libraries are:
   • Twitter (plug: I’ll probably RT you if you direct a message to @lorenbaxter).
   • On the Axure Forum.
   • Submit to Axure’s official list of resources.

Happy prototyping!

Here’s a quick summary of what we’re going to do: Pick something that you are working on, and use FreeMind to do a little brainstorm on how to improve it.  We’ll quickly create a sweet chart filled with ideas and inspiration that will turn the project from a hum-drum, rut filled chore into a feather in your cap.  If you’ve done GTD before, you’ll appreciate the end result: getting Stuff out of your head and into a document.

Step 1: Pick the Project

You have dozens of unfinished projects – we all do.  Pick one that may be interesting or that you’re stuck on.  It can be anything from redesigning your blog (see my screenshot, above), to a client project, to the greatest treehouse ever.

Step 2: Get the Tools

Download, install, and run Freemind, an open source Mind Mapping software.  I’ve also heard good things about MindManager, but it’s not free.  I’ll stick with Freemind for this one.

Step 3: Start the Map

Create a new Freemind project – you are now the proud owner of a little bubble in the middle of your screen.  Enter the title of your project in this bubble.

Now, come up with your top 3-5 areas of concern with this project.  Create one child node off of your bubble for each concern.  The keyboard shortcuts in Freemind are very important – it’s not the most immediately usable design, but remains manageable – so try to use the Tab, Enter, and Arrow keys to manage your nodes as you do this.

Step 4: Explore your Ideas

This is where the fun really happens.  Follow each area of concern all the way down the rabbit hole.  Chase it down your mind, logging sub nodes and notes, ideas and concerns, until each area of concern simply runs out of things to say.

In the process, you may find that there are other areas to note, reorganizations to make, or completely new ways of using the Mind Map.  That’s the great part about it – it’s relatively freeform, so you can make it match your thought process however you see fit.  I like to apply the built in icons to categorize various notes in the map.

Keep writing things down until you have exhausted the topic.  When you’re ready, call it done!

Step 5: Have a Beer

Don’t you feel better already?  You’ve offloaded all this Stuff from your mind, probably had some great new ideas, and made the project more manageable.