UI design becomes increasingly important for products and services. Influencing their users' expierence. UX itself determines the value of digital offerings and is their key differentiator. But "historically grown" incoherent interfaces deteriorate value and brand of products and services.
This talk is about design systems, that help to avoid (or overcome) design dept and to enable scaling UX across platforms, products and devices. Modularity and standardisation of repeatedly used aspects helps speeding up processes and increasing business value. Design systems help making user experience tangible to teams and brand values actionable.
8. @BennoLoewenberg
– Lots of people and tools involved
– Little-to-no testing (technical and UX)
– Minimal-to-no documentation or specification
– Disparate components across all lines of business
UX & DESIGN DEBT
12. @BennoLoewenberg
… easier to use,
but limited set of choices
(e. g. just a bit of hot water
cannot be selected)
US/CA SHOWER FAUCET
13. @BennoLoewenberg
UI design becomes increasingly important
for products and services.
UX determines the value of digital offerings
and is their key differentiator .
MULTI-SCREEN & OMNI-CHANNEL
14. @BennoLoewenberg
+ Design debt reduction (cohesive brand & UX)
+ More focus on UX & specialties (no redundancies)
+ Speeding up the processes (design, handover, code)
+ Increasing business value (maintainability, scalability)
GOALS
17. @BennoLoewenberg
read: does NOT equal
Design System ≠ Style Guide
Design System ≠ Pattern Library
Design System ≠ System Design
Design System ≠ Sketch Library
DE-TERMINATION
18. Source: Nathan Curtis [commented]
“ A style guide is an artifact
of design process.
A design system is a living, funded product
with a roadmap & backlog,
serving an ecosystem.”
19. @BennoLoewenberg
+ Blueprint for baseline UI and interaction patterns
+ Rules defining the interplay of technological
and visual components for consistent UX
+ Codify a system to encourage re-use
across products for a cohesive UX
INTERPLAY
20. @BennoLoewenberg
+ Standardisation of basics frees up to focus on
e. g. research, inspiration for new concepts,
handoff process, holistic view on features
and their impact to the system.
+ Structure for the foundation of all products
and product versions, without requiring
a lot of efford each time.
FACILITATION
25. @BennoLoewenberg
Designing for modules and their interplay
in different screens, not static pages.
Design for change of products, platforms
and user-related affordances.
ADAPTABILITY
26. INTERRELATED INDEPENDENT PARTS
@BennoLoewenberg (aft. Diana Mounter)
Element Component Page layout Interaction model
27. “ Describing what something IS before
attempting to describe what it looks like:
Defining the semantics of a design language
is fundamental to design at scale.”
Source: Mark Dalgleish [commented]
33. Sources: Jeremy Keith & Tim Bendt [commented]
“ It’s not very useful to create a library
of patterns without providing any
framework for using those patterns.”
“ A design system is [primarily] a tool for
documentation and communication.”
37. @BennoLoewenberg (aft. Dominic McPhee)
STYLE GUIDE
PATTERN LIBRARY
Design Language Making it real
PRINCIPLES
DOCUMENTATION
LIVING STYLEGUIDE
UI & UX KITS
major
success
factor
GOVERNANCE
62. BIG PICTURE
+ Establish a baseline framework
+ Care for company-wide awareness of it and its use
+ Institute a global design and development tool set
+ Implement a “single source of truth” across all LOBs
+ Constanly review and maintain the design system
@BennoLoewenberg
64. INITIATION
1. Element audit
2. User research and features determination
3. Object-repository identification
4. Minimum viable design system
5. Pilot project (reference design showcase)
@BennoLoewenberg
66. Source: Gall’s Law on Complex Systems [commented]
“ A complex system that works, has evolved
from a simple system that worked.
A complex system designed from scratch
never works nor can be patched up to work.
Start (over) with a working simple system ”
67. LITTLE STEPS
Start small
core elements & assets everyone can understand & use
Make it usable
tokenize design options & showcase pages & elements
Use it
prioratize it, conduct design clinics, demos & audits
to foster design & development convergence
@BennoLoewenberg
69. PRODUCT
It is NOT a simple side project !
A design system is a full-blown product
serving other software products.
It significantly influences the quality of the products,
that are built with it and therefore is a success factor
@BennoLoewenberg
70. SUCCESS FACTORS
A design system needs strategy and resources
as every “regular” product.
For it’s successful realisation many participants
need to contribute to it.
Designers and developers will keep supporting it ,
only if they have ownership of the design system.
@BennoLoewenberg
71. NEVER DONE
It is NOT a one-off !
To keep a design system alive, relevant,
it constantly needs to be maintained .
The bigger it grows, the shorter the cycles need to be
for checking its affordances, quality and updating it .
@BennoLoewenberg
72. @BennoLoewenberg (aft. Ken Skistim)
BALANCE
Flexibility Consistency
Design System
Create everthing
from scratch
Only use what
comes in-the-box
73. @BennoLoewenberg (aft. Firefox Photon)
BALANCE
Similarity
PlatformProduct
Familiarity
0
Design System
Bad Usability
No Brand
75. Source: Wolf Brüning
“ Four problems a design system
can help you to avoid:
• Inconsistencies,
• Misunderstandings,
• Thinking in Pages,
• Duplicate Work.”