Laziness & The Web Designer: How Some Tools Make Designers Lazy

Enough said, Macaw is going to be one of those tools that separate incapable designers from the ones who know why flexbox is coming to be and what it means.

Agreed, I haven't used Macaw but have seen some demonstrations. I did recently use a trial of http://webflow.com/ and although it's a great tool I found it pretty slow and inefficient compared with hand coding. Maybe this is how the next generation will design websites but for me wysiwyg editors never sit right.

I agree. In some ways, tools like Macaw do promote laziness. You could compare it to the slicing tool in Photoshop that web designers used to use in the late 90s.

However, both design and frontend development are becoming more specialized roles--especially for large web applications. A designer may be proficient in CSS/HTML but it may not be her forte. She may spend most of her time in design software creating wireframes and mockups and a smaller amount of time actually producing CSS/HTML. Furthermore, some large web applications are so complex (in terms of javascript and ajax) that production HTML/CSS is only written by frontend developers.

Therefore, a tool like Macaw is brilliant for a designer who wants to quickly produce actual working prototypes to show interaction, responsiveness, and animations to developers. Simply delivering static screens to developers is not enough anymore.

And, I'm not sure that designing all in the browser is the best approach, especially if you're working on a complex web application. Designing in some design software allows you to brainstorm and iterate through many different design ideas before settling on something.

Furthermore, Macaw doesn't take away your job of writing CSS code. You still have to organize DOM elements and set class names.

PS Macaw didn't pay me to write this. I just think their product is very compelling for rapid prototyping.

It seems far too simplistic to declare "Macaw will make you into a lazy designer" or "Macaw will transform the way we design the web". Both sides seem to ignore the fact that Macaw is a tool, not the tool.

Macaw (or something that builds off of what Macaw starts) will find a niche in prototyping designs that handcoding will be too slow to do.

Handcoding will remain the backbone and the quality control.

I work with a lot of folks that produce content but have no need, and no time, to learn HTML/CSS. But a tool like Macaw can allow them to deliver content in a way that I can refine instead of building from the ground up. Now, that flow may end up being a terrible waste of time, but a tool that met that niche well would be a welcome addition to my life.

I won't be building a site with Macaw - but I will gladly accept content designed in Macaw to build off of.

Does this argument work for illustration as well? Do you prefer to write SVG using a text editor instead of using Illustrator?