Figma For Developers
Together, designers and developers could define naming conventions for Styles early in the process, building a unified shared design language across the team. Or afterward, by uniforming similar Styles, cross-checking color contrast or reviewing the product over a quick Slack call.
Figma for Developers
As design tools modernized, this process got more streamlined. Designers would often use separate tools like Zeplin or Invision to handoff the designs to developers. Developers now had better access to the designs and had more tools available to extract information about typography, colors, and measurements. Although it was easier to find the latest version of a design for everyone, designers needed to work in separate tools and keep them in sync. A big improvement but still not perfect.
Absolutely. Hi, all, I'm Ryan, designer, coder, hybrid. I am on a mission to bridge the gap between code, engineering, and design.I think more specifically, it is to help developers learn to design. But both ways for sure.I think design and having some design knowledge can help you be a better developer, you don't need to be a master of design to be a better engineer and better empathize with our co-workers, users, etc.
Absolutely. That is what we are after today, how can we as developers take advantage of these tools to get better outcomes. We were going to look into Figma.So before we start, a quick shout out. We have live captions going at LWJ.dev/live if you want to -- that's weird. Who am I logged in as? It is not letting me post to my own chat. So if you want to go to the lwj.dev/live, we have captions by White Coat Captioning, thank you Lindsay for your help today. The captions are made possible Nullify and Fauna, we are looking for more sponsors, we want to make sure the show is accessible to everybody. Reach out if you would like to take part in making streaming more accessible to more people.With that being said, Ryan, we are going to work with Figma today. How do you want to do that? What do you want to actually do?
We have that in open screens, we will drag that in. So we are hitting K because we are using the stale, this is a complex shape that I don't want to -- so I am just going to scale it on down. We can drop that in here. And that -- it is almost to the top. We will leave that there. There's a question in the chat. Where is my chat? Does Figma let you know the complexity implications for developers from the design you create?
Until recently designers and developers were often frustrated with their communication and felt like they were on different planets. Important details were getting lost, specs had to be written manually, and the whole collaboration process seemed to hover in open space.
Nowadays many designers including the Eleken team create designs and hand them over to developers in Figma. In this article, we will show you how we create designs of SaaS products and collaborate with different development teams using Figma as our main tool.
Later tools evolved for the good, and developers started using different solutions designed for handoff. With the help of these tools, developers could extract the information they needed to implement design like color codes, fonts, measurements of elements, and other specs.
This made collaboration easier for developers, but as for designers, there was still some hassle, as they needed to keep their tools synced with other tools. But then Figma appeared on the market and quickly won the hearts of designers and the rest of the product teams.
One of many reasons why not just designers but people who manage design teams love this tool is because Figma makes collaboration super easy. You literally need to just share Figma with developers by sending a link or invite:
Right in the Figma file, the designer leaves comments for developers about what to pay attention to. Figma has a lot of features that allow describing right inside the component how it works. For example, you can leave a note about the most significant changes (like on the left screen below), or build user flows between actual screen designs (screen on the right).
Figma is like a super space station where the product is built and designers and developers can collaborate easily. The tool has made the design handoff process as quick as never before and serves product teams as the most collaborative design tool.
It is not a must, but most UI/UX designers are adopting Figma for design handoff. Considering this trend, in near future, front-end developers might need to get familiar with Figma. Learning new tools may seem to be very troublesome and time-wasting stuff sometimes. But reading the contents below might change your point of view and encourage you to learn Figma.
Traditionally, designers used to send an email to the developers with attachments consisting of graphics, assets, and text documents with the page copy. And developers have to figure it out based on that scattered information. Even though they want to get access to the original design source, they do not have access to them. This is mainly because the license fee for designing software products is expensive and they do not these software products as designers do. Also, it took a long time to follow up on requested tasks and updates because communication channels were scattered across email, SaaS, meeting notes, etc.
Even though things got better as technology advanced, things were not perfect. Designers started adopting tools like Zeplin or Invision to hand off the designs to developers, and developers got better access to the designs and extract the information they needed such as typography, colors, and measurements. But designers needed to work with separate tools and had to keep them in sync, and things still remain to be inefficient.
Considering this history, it is understandable why designers started using Figma and why front-end developers should try learning to use Figma. Figma shook up the design handoff process and streamlined it to be more efficient dramatically as it has the following features:
Figma is browser-based and completely cloud-based so they can use it regardless of their operating system and without installing anything. Unlike the traditional design handoff process, both designers and developers can get access to the latest version of the design anytime and anywhere. On top of that, it is free to start with basic features in Figma and an unlimited number of collaborators, so you do not have to worry about the price issue.
While Figma is fairly intuitive, allowing developers to navigate design files easily, handoff is still never as straightforward as simply sharing a prototype link. Here are a few tips on overlooked features to help you better navigate your next project in Figma.
Creating professional-looking shadows has never been easier. Thanks to the Shadow maker plugin, you can give depth to your design like a pro at Dribbble and Behance with one click. However, be careful that your Front end developers do not curse you for 10-level shadows.
Use this plugin to quickly export assets for Android. A designer working on mobile applications who often needs to export developers' assets will appreciate this plugin.Android resources export prepares assets in both drawable and Nine-patch folders. Except for exporting Nine-Patch you can also export adaptive app icons to the Play Store.Availability: Android Resources Export Figma plugin Are you interested in UX / UI design process we have in GoodRequest?Get to know it in 8 steps and don't forget to write the inspiration or tip in the comment. ?
Always the last in line on projects, developers are often given extra short amounts of time to get their work complete, due to those common crazy deadlines that don't leave much time or breathing room when it comes to implementation of a design.
The Developer Tools team exists in recognition that developers play a crucial part in not only the development, but also the design of products. The Developer Tools team works closely with many other product and engineering teams to ensure Figma continues to push the boundaries of collaboration between design and engineering.
A designer and a developer have quite distinct roles in the workplace, but as product creation necessitates close collaboration, tools like Figma have made it easy for designers and developers to work together.
Working with a solid design system enhances designer-developer communication. You can create a clear framework and complement the design stages with examples so that developers can see functionality in action.
So find out if your developers need additional information. To assist them, you can use Zeplin to show all components in just one click. You can pin design instructions for components using linked annotations; that remains attached wherever the component is used in a project, with documentation alongside the screen.
Meet designers, grow your network, and build design skills at in-person events and in our online community. Open to everyone interested in learning more about Figma; advanced practitioners, aspiring designers and developers, and creatives of all types.
You can label elements that are linked to something in your component library. Clicking the label lets developers see component properties, or they can see the same component in different states. For example, seeing a button when pressed or hovered. Labeled components also link to the broader style guide for easier development.
You can clearly communicate and label design iterations each time you push a new design to Zeplin. This keeps developers informed about updates. The system will keep track of project version history so you can reference or reimplement previous designs.
The ability to collaborate seamlessly between designers and developers can make a significant impact on the quality and speed of delivering software products. For .NET developers, integrating Figma into their development process can be a game-changer, especially when working with cross-platform applications. 041b061a72