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Why Figma Wins

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Re: Why Figma Wins

#181

Post by nojvek »

Stevvo wrote: post #141
SenHeng wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not figma’s fault, that’s a team communication and workflow issue. We have that at work too and the solution is to communicate. Have a big red box with text saying the modal is not ready, or simply don’t have a modal until it’s ready. Better stick, create placeholder components and use those. Replace when ready.

Agreed. In my company, your responsibility as a developer is to implement the design as shown on figma, pixel perfect. If something is incorrect on the design, someone will usually have noticed it and fixed it before I get the chance, because there are 4 sets of eyes on it (CTO, PM, Designers, Developer)

It depends on what is being built. Pixel perfect on the first iteration is not a great idea. Because on the first iteration we are usually trying to figure out “does this even solve the problem” and show that to users. After many iterations you have a rough plan. Then you build a quirky mock with existing components you have. Then you let users play with it and find existing rough edges and smooth them out.

Then you build a much nicer version (perhaps pixel perfect) and then have a lot of users play with it, and then your analytics funnels tell you where the bottlenecks are. So you make even more iterations until you make something that solves the problem in a delightful manner and users are going bonkers about it.

The TLDR is, there is no point getting pixel perfect in the first iteration. Good software requires tons of iterations and the entire pm-design-eng-user workflow should be optimized for faster iterations and learning.

A good design system + mockups get your that.

Re: Why Figma Wins

#183

Post by satvikpendem »

josefrichter wrote: post #150
satvikpendem wrote: post #42

Figma approaches design from an engineer's perspective. They have features like auto layout [0], swapping elements in a list, scaling multiple elements at once while preserving each aspect ratio, and so on. Can you imagine that if designers before this wanted to move an element in a list, they would have to move every single one instead of having some drag and drop swap functionality? That if they wanted to dynamical…

Framer doesn't spit out React code once you're done. Code used in prototyping is hugely different and unusable in production. And Framer makers know this and openly talk about this, they're not trying to be a code generator.

Sure you may not use the components wholesale but you can still pick out specific parts, such as full CSS code or bezier curves as the sibling poster put it.

Re: Why Figma Wins

#184

Post by greyswan »

uxcolumbo wrote: post #164
greyswan wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there powerful prototyping plugins for Figma? I'd love it if the answer is yes. Axure is horrible for wireframing and a non-starter for visual design, but it has the most powerful prototyping features I've seen by a long shot. Framer is straight up writing React code, so I don't count that as an option for the vast majority of designers.

Why do you think Axure is horrible for wireframing?

I guess that isn't fair. It doesn't have all the layout assistance and plugins that Sketch and Figma have. It is perfectly fine as a wireframing tool.

Re: Why Figma Wins

#185

Post by cynusx »

memexy wrote: post #89
cynusx wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It sounds like Figma reduces friction in the collaboration process by clever use of cloud based and browser coordination. It's not innovative but it's a good application of existing technology to the design space. Out of curiosity, what do you consider innovative?

Good question. Do you have a definition we can work with? I tend to focus on theoretical innovations like mathematical theories so my definition is often at odds with what most people think is innovative.

Often innovation is in the eye of the beholder, for a clerk that's been manually entering data for years it might be innovative that it can be replaced with digitalization but for most researchers that's just "implementation" of existing tech.

I don't hold opinions on what the word should mean, just curious to find all the different meanings of it

Re: Why Figma Wins

#186

Post by karaterobot »

mch82 wrote: post #134
karaterobot wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We use a shared Figma component library, which gets implemented as a shared Storybook library for front end developers. In theory, this means the designers are designing with components which are already represented in code, and as long as they update the library with any new or modified components, it should be straightforward: a change in the Figma library represents a change that needs to be reflected in Storybook…

What impact is Storybook.js having on your team? I’ve recently started using it with my team and the impact has been positive. Component sandboxing seems to encourage developers to encapsulate CSS within web components. Sandboxing also seems to encourage thinking about web component APIs and designing them for reuse. How well is Storybook.js catching on as an emerging standard in UI development?

We like Storybook a lot. It's made communication between Design and FE a lot smoother. I wouldn't say it clears up all ambiguity, or eliminates all redundancy, but it's a noticeable improvement over relying on institutional knowledge alone!

When I joined about six months ago, the team was already using it, and keeping it up to date had become ingrained in the culture. I had nothing to do with it, so I can say it's been a good decision.

I have no idea if it's catching on in the wider world! Anecdotally, of the five places I interviewed at last year, two of them claimed to be using it.

Re: Why Figma Wins

#187

Post by hizxy »

Figma didn’t “fix” design collaboration, it just made it easier. If your org has poor design maturity then the tool doesn’t matter.

Re: Why Figma Wins

#188

Post by lloydatkinson »

vosper wrote: post #31

We use Figma at work, and while it’s a nice tool I think it’s easy to fall (or maybe we just fell) into a kind of uncanny valley. The designs we get are close to realistic mockups of our actual UI, but are often not 100% there, and it’s the little deviations that can be quite distracting. Engineer: So are we changing the nav icons as part of this story, too? Designer: Oh, no, ignore that. I didn’t have our real icon…

Sounds like a person problem not a tool problem.

Re: Why Figma Wins

#189

Post by [deleted] »

kaelig wrote: post #2

I championed the rollout of Figma at my company and what this article mentions is true: this is a tool for design, not just for designers. We initially thought we'd need to provision the same number of licenses as we did for Sketch/InVision/Abstract. Turns out way more people started to get involved in the design process and we now have a more inclusive design practice. Content strategists, UX developers, researchers…

[deleted]

Re: Why Figma Wins

#190

Post by achow »

Love Figma!

However, their enterprise licence is $45/month ($540 annually)! That is ludicrous for the functionality that the app provides.

In comparison Microsoft or Adobe software (Photoshop is $250/annum) has immense amount of technology & man month behind - Photoshop has been in development since 1990, and Microsoft Office must be in development for similar amount of period and have perhaps 5K+ employees (wild guess).

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