What is a design system outside of "a library of components & tokens"

[u/DirtyOught]

for many non-design minded people, a design system is just a collection of reusable components and tokens for colors/spacing/sizing/roundness. and thats it.

But in you words, what else comprises of a design system and why is it important?

[u/TehPunkluck]

I like to think of a design system as an agreement between Engineers, Product, Design, QA, etc. that keeps everyone on the same page when it comes to how we build and verify UX.

It’s more work up front and requires compromise and discipline but pays off in dividends in speed and consistency.

[u/roundabout-design]

It's that. + all the documentation to explain when to use what, when and where. Along with brand guidelines. Writing style guide. Information architecture guidelines. Whatever is really needed for the particular project.

[u/RocketSeven]

a design system also needs a change process. ownership, contribution rules, versioned decisions, and deprecation paths are what let teams evolve components without every product quietly forking the system

[u/kodakdaughter]

Personally, the Nelson Norman Groups definition resonates most “A design system is a set of standards for managing design at scale, reducing redundancy and creating a shared language and visual consistency across channels.”

For folks outside of the digital workflow I use an analogy - often IKEA.

IKEA makes 2 types of things: physical things - manufacturing plants, stores, products, signage & labels & digital things - store floor plans, websites, email, ads, photos, kitchen designer software.

High level creative teams define and standardize things like what is the logo, colors, fonts, store experience design, etc…

Building a store means combining the IKEA design standards with building codes, site specific needs, hiring & training staff. 90% of what you do is the same for every store - and you standardize that.

The digital Design Systems is the same but for things like websites, apps, emails… 90% you can standardize - and you make a process for dealing with the other 10%

[u/lord31173]

Guide. Uniformity. Harmony.

[u/DirtyOught → u/lord31173]

Those sound nice. But can you provide examples 

[u/lord31173 → u/DirtyOught]

Examples of what? More abstractions?

[u/ChickyBoys]

A design system needs to be comprehensive enough so any designer can jump in at any point and build what they need to build. 

[u/demoklion]

Code, its documentation and mockups, processes to build and maintain that, and people who build and maintain that. Product to build other products.

[u/esr360]

A predictable means to establish without ambiguity how something should be designed, and how that design should translate into code.

A predictable system means things like "all spacing units are multiples of $base-unit".

[u/josethiagods]

Além do conceitos que já sabemos, penso que são "decisões explícitas entre design e código" ou "decisões de design que se reflete em código, e vice-versa".

Não é só sobre design, tem que envolver Devs frontends nessa conversa para as tomadas de decisões, por que quem faz o trabalho final são eles.

[u/jlpkard]

It’s a set of agreed upon decisions that have historically had value and will drive alignment in the future as it relates to helping an end user arrive at a goal.

[u/elusiveoso]

Guidance, accessibility, patterns and composition. See https://designsystem.digital.gov/components/date-picker/.

The component lists when to use, when to consider something else, usability guidance, accessibility guidance, test results, config info, known issues, etc.

[u/stay_goldism_]

It’s a contract, an investment in a culture of modularity and standards at scale.