The importance of Prototyping: a robot made out of Lego - the building blocks of the Power Platform - is helping to build the building blocks of life

You're a group of undergraduate students on a lab course at 美国亚利桑那州立大学 tasked with building tools using "frugal science".??????????

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So what do you do? ??

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You take the same approach that Microsoft Power Platform #Hackathons do, get out your storage boxes full of #Lego kit parts, and start prototyping! ??

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?Prototyping

So what is prototyping? ???

Prototyping takes the out-of-the-box state and, with the customer's needs in mind, performs minimal tailoring of the app (or in this case, the device) to reflect the customer's requirements.

?The main benefit of prototyping identified by Microsoft Learn is for Solution Architects to use them during #PreSales or #Delivery, to help tell a story during a demo that the customer can relate to when trying to solve their particular pain points, or identify their objectives by being able to envision the solution. ???♀?

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Prototyping can also be used post-delivery, however, as part of continuous Value Stream Analysis and CI/CD (Continuous Improvement, Continuous Development), by cheaply and quickly exploring possible enhancements, reducing risk by front-loading the elimination of unknown issues before moving the requirement into the #Backlog and #Development. ??

Prototyping using LEGO and the Power Platform

In the case of the 美国亚利桑那州立大学 students, they looked at the equipment they had in their laboratory - their version of the Microsoft Dynamics 365 suite of apps - and considering how they might improve existing lab routines.?They reached into their the LEGO Group kit - as our #Makers do with the #PowerPlatform - and using gears, connecting blocks and two motors, built a Lego robot version of a traditional "gradient mixer".

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These mixers perform a procedure to mix the liquid content of cylindrical tubes, first tilting the tubes from vertical to horizontal, then rapidly spinning them around.?This creates a single liquid with a density that uniformly decreases from the bottom to the top. After being mixed, the liquid can be used for purifying tiny structures made of #DNA molecules that researchers want to use as tiny machines to carry out tasks inside of cells, and shed new light on how naturally occurring molecular machines, like proteins, work.

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How cool is that! ??

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Many conventional methods for creating density gradients require hard-to-use and expensive machines.?The Lego robot, made completely out of Lego kit apart from the tube holder that the student researchers had to 3D print - the equivalent of your Microsoft Dataverse plugin written using #PowerFx functions - is a smaller and faster version that could make the purification process both cheaper and quicker.

There are caveats… ?

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Why customisation isn't always the answer

Just as with the out-of-the-box Microsoft Dynamics 365 's apps, #customisation isn't always the answer. ?

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The purification procedure includes devices other than the Lego robot, so the robot itself may not be of use to other #laboratories that don't already have this remaining equipment.

i.e. if your customer needs an #Enterprise-grade Customer Insight - Journey (nee #D365 Marketing app) solution...

...don't build this from scratch using the Microsoft Power Platform ! ??

Cost is also very much a material factor. ??

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The Lego robot cost about $350 to make.?Store-bought devices range from $500 and $5000.?

?If your customer's 'purification' procedure can be made quicker and achieve a ten-fold cost saving, then go for it! ??♀?

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If the cost-benefit analysis is more #marginal, then you'd be better using your and your customers' most valuable resource - time ? - on different efficiency opportunities. ??