The newline Guide to React Component Design Systems with Figmagic
This course is a comprehensive guide to building a React component library based on a well-architectured design system. You’ll create a full component-based React-driven application with Figmagic, underpinned by Storybook, good documentation, and with CI and automated testing. Learn senior-level system architecture skills for frontend React code; skills you can apply broadly in working on any frontend application.
- 4.1 / 5 (14 ratings)
- Published
- Updated
Mikael Vesavuori
Cloud Software Architect (and Technical Standards Lead) at Polestar
01Remote
You can take the course from anywhere in the world, as long as you have a computer and an internet connection.
02Self-Paced
Learn at your own pace, whenever it's convenient for you. With no rigid schedule to worry about, you can take the course on your own terms.
03Community
Join a vibrant community of other students who are also learning with The newline Guide to React Component Design Systems with Figmagic. Ask questions, get feedback and collaborate with others to take your skills to the next level.
04Structured
Learn in a cohesive fashion that's easy to follow. With a clear progression from basic principles to advanced techniques, you'll grow stronger and more skilled with each module.
How to set up a continuous design pipeline from code to CI/CD, using some of the best services out there
What Figma, Figmagic, and design tokens are and how they enable you to be more productive
How design tokens can function as a contract between designers and developers, setting up powerful new ways of working
Generate React components using Figma
The history of design/code tooling and how to argue for process and tooling change
Understand the value of documentation, using Storybook and Figma to document your work
Among developers and architects, "continuous integration and delivery/deployment" (CI/CD for short) has increasingly become the norm for almost two decades. And while frontend development has gone through the framework revolution, going from design to code with the speed expected of CI/CD is still a pain. But it doesn't need to be!
This 10-module course is taught by Mikael Vesavuori, an architect and developer who has helped companies like Polestar redefine their technology and design processes, tooling and ways of working.
In the course, we will create a full component-based React-driven application with Figmagic, underpinned by Storybook, good documentation, and with CI and automated testing.
We will bring the dev-designer collaboration to its current state-of-the-art with a DevOps-inspired life cycle, which could be called “continuous design” (after continuous integration/deployment or CI/CD).
While there is a pre-defined, specific toolset that we’ll use, the end goal of the course is to teach you a wider perspective of what it means to work end-to-end with design systems. Nearly all individual tools are exchangeable: we’re more interested in the capabilities enabling our desired way-of-working than the specific tools chosen to get there.
Our students work at
Course Syllabus and Content
Introduction
2 Lessons
A "welcome" is in order, and let's also set some expectations while we are at it!
I hope you are excited! We'll be using some very nice tools and some skeletons I've pre-provided to fast-track our way to a design system!
Preparation
6 Lessons
Let's take care of the essentials first, like setting up a development environment, Git and Node.
Figma reshaped how millions of people and companies follow the design process. Now, we're going to form our process around it.
Get a spot in the world's biggest (probably!?) JavaScript community—NPM.
Get hooked up with the premier place on the planet to share, build, and discuss code—open source or otherwise.
Next stop is hosting, where we'll use Cloudflare Pages, one of the most exciting tech services around.
Last but not least, we need to get our visual inspection platform and Storybook hosting working. For this, we will turn to Chromatic.
Enabling 'Continuous Design'
6 Lessons
Let me introduce you to my take on the concept of "continuous design."
Time to set the stage and see what we can do to be a top shop using continuous design principles and tooling.
A diagram can be the difference between an organization of "petty kings" doing their own thing and having actionable plans built on a shared identity. What we need is some kind of governance.
One magic, simple concept (design token) and a one-stop shop to contain our design equal one hell of a powerhouse.
Going from static files, private work, and image-based output to a collaborative, real-time component-oriented tool changes everything about the design workflow.
Figmagic is the last piece in our toolchain that acts as the glue needed to super-charge your productivity.
Setting up a pipeline for design and code
6 Lessons
It's high time to get to know the Figma API, one of the real stars of our show.
Time to get knee-deep in coding, which we will kick-start by using a bit of boilerplate that we're going to scaffold.
It's vital we have a solid grounding for our component workflow if we are to build an entire library of them. In this lesson, we will set up a smooth, component-driven development workflow from code to Storybook.
That song with the "I like to move it-move it" lyrics must have been about pushing code to production...right?
While dogfooding does sound yucky, it's a word that connotes the practice of using one's own things, sometimes to build something new. That's what we will do now with the components we've built.
Putting in the last fixes for our tooling means getting our Continuous Integration operational.
Getting to know Figmagic
3 Lessons
With all the other hard, boxy stuff behind us, the perspective now moves to the front-end components and Figma.
Working effectively with Figmagic means understanding how and what it actually parses from a document.
Getting to know the configuration options is super important if you want to make the best use of Figmagic.
Starting our design system
3 Lessons
Let's find our way by analyzing our UX sketches before digging into the details and building anything.
Let's move on from basics to the intermediate level and actually make some designs.
Let's put the Figma-first approach to the test by taking the step to turn a design into code.
Building elements and components
5 Lessons
And now for some bells and whistles—graphics and icons!
Galloping ever onwards, we'll wave our magic wand and summon our low-complexity components.
Now, we leave the easy flat components for the more detailed nested ones!
Code generation with Figmagic 4 will only take you so far. For our most important and complicated components, we will need to do some manual work, composing small bits into more advanced ones. Let's compose one from what we've made so far!
Extra credit time—adding the components for the checkout view.
Documentation and Storybook
3 Lessons
Good documentation is vital and shows that you care about your design system and those who will use it. Lacking good documentation practices could spell doom for a design system.
The very first documentation step we will take is to describe what we have built so far.
Storybook is a brilliant tool for documentation, and we'll make good use of it in several ways.
The design life cycle
6 Lessons
We have talked about "continuity" a lot, so it's about time we address how to deal with change in practice.
Things need to be in order before we continue.
Time to fill up our UI platform with our work to date!
Communicating and giving feedback on our work is the lifeblood of a design system.
Let's automate the release of new components.
Time to place the final cherry on the top. Cue up "I've got the power"!
Subscribe for a Free Lesson
By subscribing to the newline newsletter, you will also receive weekly, hands-on tutorials and updates on upcoming courses in your inbox.
What Students are Saying
Meet the Course Instructor
Purchase the course today
One-Time Purchase
newline Guide to React Component Design Systems with Figmagic
- Discord Community Access
- Full Transcripts
- Project Completion Guarantee
- Lifetime Access
newline Pro Subscription
$18/MO
Get unlimited access to the course, plus 60+ newline books, guides and courses. Learn More
Billed annually or $40/mo billed monthly. Free to cancel anytime.
- Discord Community Access
- Full Transcripts
- Project Completion Guarantee
- Lifetime Access
Plus:
- Unlimited access to 60+ newline Books, Guides and Courses
- Interactive, Live Project Demos for Every newline Book, Guide and Course
- Complete Project Source Code for Every newline Book, Guide and Course
- Best Value 🏆
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is this course for?
This course is for everyone who ever asked themselves: 'Why does the front-end workflow suck, year after year?' In this course, I attempt to provide a holistic solution to that question, from theory and principles to tooling and actual full-scale implementation.
What is the ratio of coding vs Figma design?
During the course, you will both do a bit of design (according to directions in the course) but mostly it's about modifying pre-provided code. So, the ratio is more code than design, since Figma is just a necessary support.
What if I need help?
You can ask me questions anytime through the community Discord channel or by sending us a message.
