Skip to main content

max / makeover-layout

3.3 KB · 78 lines History Blame Raw
1 # makeover-layout
2
3 The renderer-agnostic half of the make-family design system.
4
5 `makeover` answers *what colour*, and varies by theme. `makeover-geometry`
6 answers *how much space*, and varies by density and surface. This crate answers
7 *what the thing is*, and varies by nothing.
8
9 ## The deferral rule
10
11 A description names intents and relationships, never values. Say `Fill::Raised`,
12 never `#D9DDF4`. Say `Gap::Peer`, never `6px`. What is left once colour and
13 spacing are deferred is composition: which edges are lit, what inverts on press,
14 what nests in what.
15
16 The constraint that shapes it: a renderer that can only paint rectangles has to
17 be able to express the result. egui has no `box-shadow: inset` and one stroke per
18 widget with no per-side control. A terminal has box-drawing characters and one
19 cell of resolution, and cannot draw a two-tone lit edge at all. So this crate
20 names the intent, and each renderer picks an expression it can produce, including
21 dropping half of one.
22
23 ## What is here
24
25 **Depth**: `Bevel`, `Edge`, `Fill`, `Depth`. Fill and bevel are named together,
26 because naming them apart lets them disagree: a region can carry a raised bevel
27 over a recessed fill. `Depth` makes that unrepresentable.
28
29 **Components**: `Token` (a badge does not answer a click, a chip does), `Notice`
30 (a toast is transient, a banner is persistent), `RowPart`, `Heading`, `Selector`,
31 `Readiness`, and `Tone`, the one intent family they share.
32
33 **Schemas**: `Field` for forms, `Column` for lists and tables. A column carries a
34 drop priority, which is what replaces addressing columns by position. Addressing columns by
35 `nth-child` means inserting a column silently hides the wrong one on a narrow
36 screen.
37
38 **Structure**: `Region` for the parts of a screen, `Arrangement` for how a screen
39 is put together. Two arrangements, because the two apps have two. `Showing` says
40 how many of a region's children are visible at once, which is what lets a
41 renderer derive a tab strip or a prev/next row for itself instead of recognising
42 a widget by name.
43
44 The vocabulary was read off audiofiles, the only implementation written by a
45 consumer with no CSS, then checked against both webview apps.
46
47 ## What is not here, on purpose
48
49 Validation. `Field` describes fields, not constraints. A schema that describes
50 fields without constraints acquires a constraint layer per app, which is the
51 divergence this crate exists to end.
52
53 ## Where the description stops
54
55 The bespoke widgets: a day-plan timeline, a kanban board, a calendar. A
56 description expressive enough to produce those is not a description any more, it
57 is a widget library with one app on top. Generate the boring 80% so the bespoke
58 20% gets the attention.
59
60 `Region::Bespoke` states that limit instead of hiding it. The description names
61 the place, the app owns the contents, and a screen with a timeline in it is still
62 a whole screen. Without that member the description would cover only the boring
63 screens, and the interesting ones would need a second path beside the router.
64 One opaque member, and `Region::described()` is how a renderer tells it from the
65 rest.
66
67 ## Status
68
69 On crates.io. A vocabulary correction ships as a major bump with a migration
70 rather than as an edit.
71
72 Design lives in the wiki note `makeover-layout`; the backlog is in GoingsOn under
73 the project of the same name.
74
75 ## Licence
76
77 MIT.
78