Rapid prototyping is an approach to software development which attempts to remedy some of the shortcomings of the linear life cycle model, e.g. its inability to cope with fuzzy requirements and system evolution. This thesis first presents a broad survey of rapid software prototyping. It describes the rationale behind the process, the applications of prototyping, and specific techniques which may be used to achieve them. We then describe a system, called EPROS, together with its methodology, which supports a number of prototyping techniques in a coherent framework. The system is comprehensive in its approach and covers the prototyping and development of both functional and human-computer interface aspects of software systems. The former is based on the execution of VDM-based formal specification notation META-IV; the latter is based on a textual representation of state transition diagrams. Dialogue development is further supported by a rich set of abstractions which allow interaction concepts to be specified and directly executed rather than implemented. EPROS is based on a wide spectrum language which supports the main phases of a software development process, namely specification, design, and implementation. Included in this notation is a meta abstraction facility which facilitates its extension by the programmer. The primary application of EPROS is for evolutionary prototyping, where a system is developed iteratively and gradually from the abstract to the detailed, while it undergoes use and while its capabilities evolve. EPROS copes with all the requirements of evolutionary prototyping, namely rapid development, intermediate deliveries and gradual evolution of the system towards the final product. The thesis also describes a number of case studies where the presented ideas are put in practice, and which provide data in support of the effectiveness of the described system.

Background- Autodesk Maya is by its long existence one of the most established 3D-modeling software that enables users to create meshes and the software can handle a majority of processes associated with graphic models, animation, and rendering. Although there are arguably different third-party plug-ins that can be used to enhance the efficiency of Maya. Maya’s own built-in rendering functions, especially its real-time rendering engine feel less efficient than other available real-time rendering options, which additionally commonly provide different rendering techniques that can be used to give a desired style to the modeled scene.  Objectives- Maya in its built-in rendering engines themselves does not offer much in terms of non-realistic rendering techniques; therefore, rendering in, for example, Toon-shading requires more work and effort. The objective is to implement a prototype plug-in to that can do real-time rendering of a realistic as well as non-photorealistic rendering technique inside of Autodesk Maya 2023. Its future aim is to address the non-effective and time-consuming task of viewing the results of light adjustments and setting the scene up for stylized renders in Maya.  Methods- Through the method of implementation, a basic plug-in to Autodesk Maya was constructed in Visual Studio using C++ and DirectX 11 library. It employs Qt-window to render the Maya scene in real-time and, additionally, has the function of Toon-shading. The prototype plug-in is then put through a simple test using manual assessment. The prototype’s visual rendered output, rendering times, processing usage, and memory usage are presented and compared to the results from Maya 2023’s built-in rendering options when rendering a constructed test-scene to find out where the plug-in requires further adjustments to its implementation. Results- The results show that a real-time plug-in with the additional function of Toon-shading was implementedusing the defined method of implementation. From the later test, the prototype’s rendered results arepresented and compared to the results of Autodesk Maya 2023’s built-in rendering options when rendering the constructed test-scene. Conclusion- The prototype by collecting information from the Maya scene and running the same data through the DirectX pipeline allows for different rendering styles to be developed and displayed through the user-friendly graphical user interface developed with the Qt-library. With the press of a button different implemented rendering styles like the one of Toon-shading can be applied to the prototype’s window display of the Maya scene. Its real-time rendering allows the user to see the implemented graphical attributes done to the scene without time delay. Which makes the job of finding the right angle for the intended render more efficient. The intended rendered scene can then easily be saved by the press of another button. The time and workflow no longer require the 3D-model to be imported to another rendering software or to apply different materials to all parts of the different Maya 3D-models when trying to achieve a non-photorealistic rendering style. The implemented prototype is very basic, andmore implementation is required before the prototype can be used as an efficient rendering alternative for stylized rendering in Maya.

This paper reflects the results of the evaluation phase of building a data production system for the retail research division of the GfK, Europe's largest market research company. The application specific requirements like end-user needs or data volume are very different from data warehouses discussed in the literature, making it a real data warehouse. In a case study, these requirements are compared with state-of-the-art solutions offered by leading software vendors. Each of the common architectures (MOLAP, ROLAP, HOLAP) was represented by a product. The result of this comparison is that all systems have to be massively tailored to GfK's needs, especially to cope with meta data management or the maintenance of aggregations.

This paper reflects the results of the evaluation phase of building a data production system for the retail research division of the GfK, Europe's largest market research company. The application specific requirements like end-user needs or data volume are very different from data warehouses discussed in the literature, making it a real data warehouse. In a case study, these requirements are compared with state-of-the-art solutions offered by leading software vendors. Each of the common architectures (MOLAP, ROLAP, HOLAP) was represented by a product. The result of this comparison is that all systems have to be massively tailored to GfK's needs, especially to cope with meta data management or the maintenance of aggregations.

Diploma thesis "Prototyping in software development" deals with the use of prototyping in software development with focus on the user interface (UI). Main goal of thesis is extension of MMSP methodology with sphere of the user interface prototyping which has been achieved by the definition of new object in the methodology. The text defines two new roles (objects): UI Designer and Graphic Designer. The roles already defined in MMSP were extended with responsibilities and tasks related to UI prototyping. Other newly added objects are Work Products (e.g. sketch or rules for creation of UI) and Tasks (e.g. sketching). The inclusion of prototyping into life-cycle phases of software development (defined by the methodology) includes all newly added objects. In the beginning the thesis generally concentrates on the definition of the term prototype and the categorization of prototypes. In the next part the thesis describes the possibilities of the use of prototyping in the process of software development and defines criteria for the selection of the best tool for creation of prototypes (wireframes). The sixth chapter focuses on the process of selection of the methodology suitable for the extension with the area of UI. The last chapter contains the MMSP methodology extension itself.

<p>Software prototyping is considered to be one of the most important tools that are used by software engineersnowadays to be able to understand the customer’s requirements, and develop software products that are efficient,reliable, and acceptable economically. Software engineers can choose any of the available prototyping approaches tobe used, based on the software that they intend to develop and how fast they would like to go during the softwaredevelopment. But generally speaking all prototyping approaches are aimed to help the engineers to understand thecustomer’s true needs, examine different software solutions and quality aspect, verification activities…etc, that mightaffect the quality of the software underdevelopment, as well as avoiding any potential development risks.A combination of several prototyping approaches, and brainstorming techniques which have fulfilled the aim of theknowledge extraction approach, have resulted in developing a prototyping approach that the engineers will use todevelop one and only one throwaway prototype to extract more knowledge than expected, in order to improve thequality of the software underdevelopment by spending more time studying it from different points of view.The knowledge extraction approach, then, was applied to the developed prototyping approach in which thedeveloped model was treated as software prototype, in order to gain more knowledge out of it. This activity hasresulted in several points of view, and improvements that were implemented to the developed model and as a resultAgile Prototyping AP, was developed. AP integrated more development approaches to the first developedprototyping model, such as: agile, documentation, software configuration management, and fractional factorialdesign, in which the main aim of developing one, and only one prototype, to help the engineers gaining moreknowledge, and reducing effort, time, and cost of development was accomplished but still developing softwareproducts with satisfying quality is done by developing an evolutionary prototyping and building throwawayprototypes on top of it.</p>

Software prototyping is considered to be one of the most important tools that are used by software engineersnowadays to be able to understand the customer’s requirements, and develop software products that are efficient,reliable, and acceptable economically. Software engineers can choose any of the available prototyping approaches tobe used, based on the software that they intend to develop and how fast they would like to go during the softwaredevelopment. But generally speaking all prototyping approaches are aimed to help the engineers to understand thecustomer’s true needs, examine different software solutions and quality aspect, verification activities…etc, that mightaffect the quality of the software underdevelopment, as well as avoiding any potential development risks.A combination of several prototyping approaches, and brainstorming techniques which have fulfilled the aim of theknowledge extraction approach, have resulted in developing a prototyping approach that the engineers will use todevelop one and only one throwaway prototype to extract more knowledge than expected, in order to improve thequality of the software underdevelopment by spending more time studying it from different points of view.The knowledge extraction approach, then, was applied to the developed prototyping approach in which thedeveloped model was treated as software prototype, in order to gain more knowledge out of it. This activity hasresulted in several points of view, and improvements that were implemented to the developed model and as a resultAgile Prototyping AP, was developed. AP integrated more development approaches to the first developedprototyping model, such as: agile, documentation, software configuration management, and fractional factorialdesign, in which the main aim of developing one, and only one prototype, to help the engineers gaining moreknowledge, and reducing effort, time, and cost of development was accomplished but still developing softwareproducts with satisfying quality is done by developing an evolutionary prototyping and building throwawayprototypes on top of it.