[awesomerobot]

During Q&A sessions at conferences someone will inevitably ask: "Which applications do you use for your work?" — which is probably the least helpful question you can ever ask if you want to improve as a designer.

There seems to be a segment of beginners in many professions that perceives the competency gap as purely a software solution.

[mruniverse]

Questions about tools are usually innocuous. It gives some insight. Experienced devs do it too. Is that team using React? Are you using Go?

Gives you an idea of where people are going. What other tools are available, how easy it will be to get help, etc.

[Steeeve]

I always ask people because the tools I have discovered are not quite what I'm hoping for.

e.g. I haven't seen a rapid prototyping tool yet that bridges the gap between powerpoint and coding well. (I hadn't actually found Axure yet, but it looks promising)

[ethanbond]

I think I agree with this sentiment. I'm really tired of the prototyping tools oriented around making ridiculous little micro interactions with just the amount of bounce or spring.

That should be built by understanding spring physics and going and sitting next to your implementing engineer. The hard stuff to prototype is what I think you're alluding to, larger navigational or IA types of hypothesis testing.

I also haven't found much there...