I think the GOV.UK Design System is very close to this. Widely tested, accessible, tech-agnostic, just needs to be more theme-able (edit - including internationalisation, thanks @whitingx )
@joelanman - I find the concept of a 🌐 Global #DesignSystem interesting and have been following along with the discussions being led by @brad_frost.
Great to see a focus on #Accessibility in the plans but feels like we risk losing a lot of creativity and diversity by working from a standardised, homogenised system. 🤔
@joelanman - The mentions I've seen in discussions relating to #Internationalisation (#i18n) and #Localisation (#l10n) seem more focused on support for language, RtL typography, etc. over the culture¹ and tradition² of Design that has already been impacted by regions more dominant and more promoted as standard bearers of Design.
How much of US/EU design thinking and theory might be imposed on any global design system and how can this inherent bias be mitigated. 🤔
@joelanman -
Your example of the GDS #DesignSystem as a frame of reference for this 🌐 Global Design System is a good call - but seeing the work³ done⁴ by various⁵ Orgs. required to extend this, and the reduction in support⁶ for other GovUK tools, also would be interesting to see more conversation to address how this Global Design System might be maintained and iterated on. 🤔
@whitingx yes maintenance is a crucial, or you lose trust. But on 'extending' just to check I'm understanding - it's a good thing that other orgs can extend it for their needs, right? That's by design. If the things they do are useful to others, they can and do make their way into the main design system.
@joelanman - That's right, extensibility is certainly a positive thing. 👍
Issue I've seen though is that these changes made at an org. specific #DesignSystem level rarely/never make it back upstream to the primary DS meaning we have further 🔀 fragmentation and disparity of approaches that become difficult/impossible to reconcile as projects progress. 🤔
As you say, these useful elements should make it back into the main DS but in regard to evidence and examples I've seen of this … ¯_(ツ)_/¯
Out of interest - Do you know if the process to move elements/components back upstream to the GDS #DesignSystem are documented anywhere? And if there are any examples/blog posts showing how this has worked to share with others? 🤔
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