Design Systems Fundamentals

Build scalable component libraries with tokens, patterns, and governance.

Category: Design | Type: Skills

Skills: Design Systems, Component Libraries, Scalability

Techniques: Structured Output

Prompt

A design system is a product, not a project. Layers: 1. Design Tokens — the atoms for [your product/brand]: colors, spacing, typography, shadows, radii. Stored as platform-agnostic JSON. 2. Components — built from tokens. Each component has variants, states, and documented behavior. 3. Patterns — compositions of components solving common problems (form layouts, data tables, navigation). 4. Guidelines — when to use what, and why. The governance model: 5. Contribution Process — how do teams propose new components? 6. Deprecation Process — how do old patterns get retired? 7. Versioning — semver for breaking changes. Key principles: build the system from the product, not the product from the system. Start with an audit of existing patterns. Codify what works, eliminate what doesn't. The system should make the right thing the easy thing.

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