Building a design system and a component library

This post is based on the series of posts: Modernizing a jQuery frontend with React. If you want to get a better overview of the motivation for this post we recommend you first read our initial post.

When we started rebuilding our frontend in React it wasn’t yet part of our design and development workflow to think about reusable UI components. Our jQuery frontend was built mainly out of Twitter bootstrap components, which were adapted for specific use cases or extended with additional functionality. New designs were created for each new feature by copying some design elements from older designs and improving or adapting them there. As the team and the application kept growing, our components evolved in multiple directions. This resulted in multiple variants of text sizes, colors, buttons and links which led to a disjointed user experience across our application.

Rebuilding our frontend in React was an opportunity for us to rethink our design and development workflow and focus on a more cohesive experience for the user. This was especially important since we knew we needed to make our app more accessible and responsive. This led to the creation of a component library which motivated the need for a design system. That process was difficult and slow at first but became exciting and useful over time.

What is a design system?

A design system is a comprehensive guide on how to create, document and use UI components. It defines a collection of rules, constraints, principles and best practices that apply to all designs. The core element of a design system is a collection of UI components, such as buttons, links and tables. For each designed component you can have usage guidelines that document choices made during design, the rules that define the component, behavior and constraints, use cases and any other details that are easy to communicate through words.

What is a component library?

A component library is a collection of reusable UI components implemented in a programming language. When supported by a design system it can also be seen as an interactive implementation of the designs and their guidelines.

Why should you care?

As Airbnb’s Karri Saarinen stated: “A unified design system is essential to building better and faster; better because a cohesive experience is more easily understood by our users, and faster because it gives us a common language to work with”.

At Karify, it helps us to create and follow our own constraints. It helps us to create a cohesive user experience on a multitude of platforms and devices. And finally, it helps our team work smarter, faster and closer together. These are some of the advantages we found in more detail:

• Communication: designers understand developers and vice-versa. Concepts that were previously difficult to understand for both sides are now much clearer. Talking about components and using the rules we defined in communication make the process of designing and developing much easier.
• Consistency: the look and feel of the application’s pages became the same. We know exactly what text size we should use for a heading or for normal text, what type of button we should use for a primary action, what colors to use to communicate the type of a certain action or piece of information, and how much spacing there should be between each type of element. If we decide to change any of those, then they can easily be changed across the entire design system, component library and application.
• Collaboration: designers and developers work closer together and are able to share ideas and insights more easily. Since it is easier to communicate it becomes easier to talk about functional constraints and to incorporate those in designs at an earlier phase. The use of a tool like Zeplin makes this process especially faster because it allows you to start a discussion in the context of any kind of detail in a design.
• Documentation: component guidelines provide clear information on how a component should look, be used, behave and why that is. If in the future a component design or implementation raises questions, it becomes easier to find the reasoning behind it and to prevent rethinking what has already been thought through before (unless it no longer makes sense).
• Modularity: all components represent small pieces of design and code with their limited set of rules and concerns. This enforces separation of concerns in both design and code.
• Maintainability: it becomes easier to keep designs and code up to date because when a component is touched all other components that use it are updated. This can also lead to extra work on older components but gives you visibility of the impact of your change.

As with any other approach we also found some disadvantages to the process of working with a design system:

• Time consuming: this was especially true in the beginning. Defining all the rules, constraints and base components like text, color and spacing can take quite a lot of discussion. Over time it becomes faster. It depends on how many new components you need to create before designing a new feature. But once you have a few it becomes super fast to reuse them in existing or new designs. The same applies to the development of the application.
• Less creativity: due to all the rules and constraints there is less space to be creative. However, this could also be seen as an advantage since that often leads to consistency.
• Steep learning curve: this applies mainly to new people joining the team because they will need to get acquainted with a lot of rules before being able to apply them consistently. On the other hand, it also makes it easier for them since the design system communicates the rules.
• Complexity: if there are components with too many dependencies on other components it can also become complex to maintain and reuse them.

Don’t let these disadvantages scare you, though. It is part of the process to learn to minimize them. Over time, the advantages become more apparent than the disadvantages.

#react #programming #atomic-design #storybook #sketch

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Glossary: Design Systems Defined for Developers and Designers

Design systems are interdisciplinary by nature. They are built and consumed by designers and developers, therefore it is important for common terminologies to exist to support the communication between these two disciplines and other related actors.

Note: while some of the concepts are explained in a way that is more related to the context of web development, most of them are applicable to other contexts as well.

📖 Glossary

In this post we will present some key concepts from design and development, explain their meaning in the context of design systems and point to any ambiguity that may exist.

Foundation/Essentials/Principles

Example of Material Design foundations

Every design system is built on top of a set of fundamental rules which are shared across components or other parts. These rules can relate to visual design (e.g. animation, colors, typography) or define more abstract principles such as brand personality or writing style.

Components

Example of Kor UI button component

Perhaps the most used term, components are individual units (such as buttons, inputs, tabs) that have defined appearances and interaction paradigms. Components can have different variations and be customized through APIs (Application Programming Interfaces).

Patterns

Example of Carbon Design login pattern

Patterns define how different components can be combined in a certain way to serve specific user goals that are often repeated across screens or applications. For example, input fields, icons and buttons can be combined in a certain way to serve the goal of signing into an application. Examples of patterns are forms, navigation and onboarding.

Note: UX patterns should not be mistaken with ‘design patterns’ in software engineering, which are also common ways of solving problems but specifically related to the context of engineering.

#ux #design #design-systems #web-development #frontend #software-development #design-systems-glossary #latest-tech-stories

Landscapes Website Design | Nature Landscapes Website Designer

Most landscapers think of their website as an online brochure. In reality of consumers have admitted to judging a company’s credibility based on their web design, making your website a virtual sales rep capable of generating massive amounts of leads and sales. If your website isn’t actively increasing leads and new landscaping contracts, it may be time for a redesign.

DataIT Solutions specializes in landscape website designing that are not only beautiful but also rank well in search engine results and convert your visitors into customers. We’ve specialized in the landscaping industry for over 10 years, and we look at your business from an owner’s perspective.

Why use our Landscapes for your landscape design?

• Superior experience
• Friendly personal service
• Choice of design layout
• Budget sensitive designs
• Impartial product choice and advice
• Planting and lighting designs

Want to talk about your website?
If you are a gardener or have a gardening company please do not hesitate to contact us for a quote.
Need help with your website? Get in touch

#nature landscapes website design #landscapes website design #website design #website designing #website designer #designer

System Databases in SQL Server

Introduction

In SSMS, we many of may noticed System Databases under the Database Folder. But how many of us knows its purpose?. In this article lets discuss about the System Databases in SQL Server.

System Database

Fig. 1 System Databases

There are five system databases, these databases are created while installing SQL Server.

• Master
• Model
• MSDB
• Tempdb
• Resource

Master

• This database contains all the System level Information in SQL Server. The Information in form of Meta data.
• Because of this master database, we are able to access the SQL Server (On premise SQL Server)

Model

• This database is used as a template for new databases.
• Whenever a new database is created, initially a copy of model database is what created as new database.

MSDB

• This database is where a service called SQL Server Agent stores its data.
• SQL server Agent is in charge of automation, which includes entities such as jobs, schedules, and alerts.

TempDB

• The Tempdb is where SQL Server stores temporary data such as work tables, sort space, row versioning information and etc.
• User can create their own version of temporary tables and those are stored in Tempdb.
• But this database is destroyed and recreated every time when we restart the instance of SQL Server.

Resource

• The resource database is a hidden, read only database that holds the definitions of all system objects.
• When we query system object in a database, they appear to reside in the sys schema of the local database, but in actually their definitions reside in the resource db.

#sql server #master system database #model system database #msdb system database #sql server system databases #ssms #system database #system databases in sql server #tempdb system database

Improving Design Handoffs: A Guide

To build an awesome and successful digital product you need to do a lot of things. Such as planning, market research, build a prototype, design it, code it, ship it etc. For this whole process, you need to go through lots of handoffs and team communications. One of the more painful handoffs is the Design-to-Development Handoff.

This happens usually as the design and development happen in 2 separate teams. The design team handles creating the design system, user interfaces, graphics and visuals. The dev team turn the design deliverables into a functional product.

What is Design-to-Development Handoff?

Design handoff is when the design team hands their deliverables over to the dev team. The dev team then begins with the implementation. This process could turn into a nightmare if there are no standards implemented. Since the product’s quality is at stake, it’s a good idea to enable a good collaboration between the two teams.

This is not rocket science. There are tons of tools and platforms available that ease the design handoff.

To maintain a smooth design handoff, both designers and developers must take part in the process.

Here are some tips for the designers and developers on how to improve the design handoff.

Tips for Designers

Be interested in the frameworks. Talk with the developers on what framework they plan to use and read about it. Are they using Bootstrap? Or Tailwind CSS? Get to know it and its possible limitations. Knowing the possibilities and limitations will help you create more suitable design elements. After studying the framework, try to use the UI elements that come with it. Map the framework’s color palette, spacing, typography settings and everything that you can. Follow the design trends for the platform that you’re designing. For example, if you’re designing an iOS app, don’t set the tab bar height by random. There are Design Guidelines for both iOS and Android available, so make sure you read them. The development team will thank you for it! Use a modern tool for UI Design. It’s time to ditch Photoshop. If you want to stay in the Adobe ecosystem, then check out Adobe XD. If not, I recommend taking a look at Figma.

#figma #ux #ux-design #web-design #ui-design #ui #design-systems #website-design

Designing Mobile Apps using the latest UI Design Principles

The mobile technology world is growing at the speed of light, and the apps have become an integral part of our daily life. We can now see an influx of technology with tools that can help create mobile apps. All of them are becoming more accessible and hence people are getting on their first app making journeys. Since the mobile app industry is getting bigger and better than ever, businesses from all corners of the world are trying to develop mobile apps for their operations and marketing. Designing a mobile app for businesses is the first step, though. Company owners are in charge of the basic look and feel of the designed product. With a brilliant mobile app design, one can establish a relationship between app and user very well.

Read Blog Here: https://www.indianappdevelopers.com/blog/designing-mobile-apps-using-latest-ui-design-principles/

#designing mobile apps #ui design principles #mobile ui design #mobile app design #ui design #app design