https://medium.com/swlh/everything-you-need-to-know-about-iot-prototyping-e4ad2739bc6a

Connected technology initiatives are making waves not only at Intel, Microsoft, and SAP, but they’re also quickly finding their place in unexpected everyday places like basketball courts, farmlands, and kitchens. Before we know it, IoT will seep into every facet of our daily lives, managing our homes, tending our gardens, and even monitoring our mailboxes. Shortly, IoT products will be as ubiquitous as cell phones are today, so now’s a great time to get involved.

Your IoT prototype is used to understand the pinch points and frame out the necessary parameters of your IoT product deployment. The prototype must be end-to-end, including a thin thread connecting the sensor through the device, network, cloud, end-user interface, and enterprise integration. However, the fact is, building an Internet of Things (IoT) prototype, although rewarding, is also a frustratingly challenging engineering process. Get used to hearing “Switch it on, this time around everything should work!”, just before switching the power of a prototype on, only to see it spectacularly fail in a very visible fashion, or much less spectacularly but a lot more commonly, do absolutely nothing.