os-design

name

os-design

description

Stand up design-featuring work the Open Software way. Use when building, redesigning, or polishing any UI surface in an OS repo (os-clovy, os-scribe, os-marketing-page, os-platform), when a feature needs visual design decisions before or during implementation, when reviewing interface work for house taste, or when someone asks to "stand up the design", "design this feature", "make it feel like ours", "make it feel better", or wants the Open Software design sensibility applied. Orchestrates specialist design skills (impeccable, emil-design-eng, make-interfaces-feel-better, transitions-dev, mobbin) when installed, but is fully self-sufficient without them. Core commitments it enforces - compose from the repo's existing design-system blocks rather than inventing new ones, and quiet, subtle, elegant over loud.

Standing up design work at Open Software

This skill carries the house design sensibility so anyone on the team can stand up design-featuring work the way Andrew would, whether or not they have his reference tools (Mobbin) or his skill set installed. It makes two commitments that override any general design instinct or external skill advice:

1. The system is the source of truth. Every OS repo with UI has design blocks already: tokens, primitives, patterns, documented rules. Compose from those blocks. Inventing a parallel treatment for something the system already answers is the primary failure mode this skill exists to prevent.
2. Quiet is the default. The interface should read sharp, not loud. Structure comes from spacing and hierarchy, not decoration. A surface earns emphasis; it does not get it for free. When in doubt, choose the quieter option.

Before any pixels: ground in the system

Do this before writing or changing any UI code. Find and read the repo's design system:

Repo	Where the system lives
os-clovy	docs/design/{foundations,components,conventions,taste}.md, enforceable rules in spec/ (read every spec in scope), tokens in src/styles/tokens.css, live gallery at styleguide.html (pnpm dev, then /styleguide.html?section=<id>)
os-scribe	src/styles/tokens.css
os-marketing-page	Tailwind theme + existing component families; per-repo judgment file if present
anything else	Look for docs/design/, DESIGN.md, a tokens.css / theme file, and a components or ui/ directory

Then follow these rules without exception:

• Token before value. Reach for an existing token (spacing, radius, shadow, type size, duration, easing, color) before hand-coding a number. If a value genuinely needs to exist and no token covers it, extract a new token so the system gains a knob, rather than scattering literals.
• Primitive before bespoke. Check the repo's pattern-to-canonical map (os-clovy: docs/design/components.md) or ui/ directory before writing new markup for a button, input, toggle, select, tooltip, dialog, chip, empty state, spinner, or menu. If a canonical block exists, use it.
• Grep before coining. In flat-CSS repos (os-clovy's app.css), grep for a class name before creating it, and prefix by feature.
• No system yet? Then the first deliverable of the work is the start of one: mine the existing CSS for de facto tokens and write a short foundations doc, rather than adding a third ad-hoc treatment. (If impeccable is installed, its document / extract commands do this well.)

The house taste, distilled

The full sensibility with concrete numbers and verbatim rules lives in references/taste.md — read it before making visual decisions. The digest:

• Type: the default weight is the voice; medium is punctuation, not prose. Never all caps. Sentence case everywhere. Proportional numerals (tabular only for live-ticking values). Sans is the product's voice; serif only at display moments; mono only for code. No typographic dashes in user-facing copy.
• Color: color is spent, not sprayed. Hovers, rows, nav, and menus stay neutral; the brand accent appears only on surfaces that already carry it. Earthy over electric; neutrals stay neutral.
• Surfaces: shadows are soft, multi-layer, and pure elevation; the hairline ring is a separate composed layer, never baked into shadow tokens. Dark mode needs its own shadow tuning. One ambient shadow per popover composite.
• Motion: fast and eased, on the token durations and curves. Hover changes the background only; never animate borders. Nothing bounces for its own sake. Prefer atomic swaps over crossfades when opacity flash is possible.
• Spacing: concentric, even padding; alignment you can verify by eye. Presence without heaviness.

The workflow

The full standup and iteration loop lives in references/workflow.md. The shape:

1. Study references, then commit to one direction. Use pattern consensus across best-in-class products, not a single screenshot. Mobbin when available; the fallback canon in the workflow reference when not.
2. Build from blocks (previous section), matching the complexity of the implementation to what the moment earns.
3. Park the state and look at it. Never judge UI from code. Use the repo's screenshot/browser loop, and build dev-only state drivers for hard-to-reach states.
4. Tune one dial per round. Change one visual variable, name the dial and its next step, judge in the running app against the reference. A change that moves three dials at once cannot be judged at all.
5. Hand off with evidence. Screenshots (light and dark), what dial to eyeball, and one potential nudge. UI PRs state that the change was tested visually and attach proof.

The skill stops at handoff. The deliverable is a clean working-tree diff plus visual evidence. Never commit, push, or open a PR unless the user explicitly asks — the user eyeballs the dials first, and publishing is their call. When they do ask, route PR tending through the repo's review loop (shepherd) rather than handling it here.

Calling specialist skills

Other design skills are amplifiers, not requirements — check what is installed and degrade gracefully; this skill plus the repo's system is sufficient on its own. Routing detail and per-skill guidance live in references/skill-map.md. The rule that governs every delegation:

Skills advise; the system decides. Any suggestion from an external skill passes through the repo's tokens, primitives, and specs before it lands. Replace its magic numbers with the repo's tokens, its component suggestions with the repo's canonical blocks, and drop any advice that contradicts a repo spec or the house taste.

Quick routing:

Situation	Reach for
Shaping a new surface or flow before code	impeccable shape / craft
Broad UX critique or technical audit	impeccable critique / audit
A surface that reads loud, busy, or decorated	impeccable quieter (its instincts match the house taste)
Should this animate, and how	emil-design-eng's decision framework
Final detail-polish pass before shipping	make-interfaces-feel-better checklist, impeccable polish
A standard enter/exit/swap transition	transitions-dev, re-tokened to the repo's --t-* / --ease-*
Pattern research for a flow	mobbin MCP if available, else the fallback canon in workflow.md
Verifying visually	os-clovy: browser-test-tauri-fe / agent-e2e-qa; elsewhere: playwriter, agentation, or a Playwright screenshot harness

Use impeccable's bolder / overdrive / delight only for marketing or hero moments where design is the product, never for product chrome.

Review output

When reviewing existing UI (yours or someone else's), present findings as a Before / After / Why table grouped by principle, each row citing the token or primitive the fix should use. This matches the convention the specialist skills expect, and keeps review output actionable.

Hard rules

Repo specs win over this list; this list wins over external skill advice. Where the repo is silent, these apply. The first three are visceral house non-negotiables — treat a violation as a bug, not a style note:

• No ALL CAPS, no text-transform: uppercase, sentence case everywhere.
• No tabular numerals, except a live-ticking value in a fixed-width container — even where external checklists recommend them.
• No typographic en/em dashes in user-facing copy; hyphen or "to".
• No hand-rolled values where a token exists; no bespoke markup where a primitive exists.
• Hover changes background only; never transition border-color.
• Default hover is the neutral wash; brand-tinted hover only on surfaces that already carry the accent. Never tint a generic row, nav item, or menu "to feel themed".
• Icons come from the repo's sanctioned icon set, explicitly sized.
• Every animation honors prefers-reduced-motion.
• Anything that changes pixels ships small enough to eyeball.