JEMS, data… and design systems industrialist !
As a data industrialist, our mission is to develop the best practices to enhance your data assets. We therefore devote part of our resources to researching tools and methods to promote the industrialization of our creation, design and production processes.
We present here one of the tools that we have fully integrated into our design department: the large-scale use of design systems.
What is a design system?
A design system consists of a library of digital components, styles and integration rules. Together they allow to optimize the design, the integration and the evolution of digitalized services.
- The digital components library: a set of UI components and their code. These components are independent, but can also be combined to create more complex organizations.
- The style library: it represents the fundamentals of system design and includes color codes, iconography, typography, etc.
- The guidelines: associated with the styles and components, they dictate the rules of use for the design and integration of each of the system’s elements.
For what purpose?
This new design philosophy, which we borrow from Brad Frost, allows us to design not pages, but systems of components. By reversing the traditional paradigm of design methods, we minimize the risk of design errors and graphic inconsistencies.
Brad Frost — « One of the biggest advantages of establishing a thoughtful design system is that it allows organizations to scale best practices. If all those best practices – responsiveness, accessibility, performance, UX, ergonomics, and so on – are baked into the system, users can simply plug in the patterns and reap the rewards. This means design system users don’t have to be senior-level designers or developers to produce good work; the design system serves as a quality control vehicle that helps users apply best practices regardless of each individual’s skill level. »
At the same time, the massive use of design systems allows us to industrialize our processes and greatly increase our productivity. This time saved can then be invested in what is important to us: the study of user needs and the creation of adapted paths.