# Stories by Nick Rout on Medium Stories by Nick Rout on Medium This is one page of public article previews, not the complete archive. Follow Next page to continue. Summaries are not the original full articles. ## Opinion: Jetpack Compose needs a Design System layer DevFeed: [Opinion: Jetpack Compose needs a Design System layer]() Original publisher: [Read original article]() Author: Nick Rout Published: 2024-03-15T14:05:16Z Content type: opinion Language: en Sources: [Stories by Nick Rout on Medium]() Topics: [Jetpack Compose](), [Design system](), [Android](), [Kotlin](), [Figma](), [multiplatform]() Tags: [android](), [components](), [compose](), [compose-multiplatform](), [design-system](), [design-systems](), [figma](), [jetpack-compose](), [kotlin](), [opinion](), [patterns](), [product-design](), [themes](), [tokens]() ### AI overview An opinion article argues that Jetpack Compose should include a design-system layer. It praises Compose's Kotlin APIs, concise UI implementation, unidirectional data flow, and tooling, while contending that design systems deserve stronger support and that Material Design should be a choice rather than the default. ### Source excerpt Photo by Clark Van Der Beken on UnsplashIn a world of Android complexity, Compose Multiplatform, design-to-code automation, and UIs that need to differentiate by brand identity and craft... Material Design should be a choice, not the default. Featured in Android Weekly Issue #614, Kotlin Weekly Issue #398, and jetc.dev Issue #205 Jetpack Compose is awesome. I'm probably preaching to the choir in saying that it gave native Android development the "shot in the arm" it sorely needed after ~10 years of XML and Views. It claims to be modern and intuitive, and it is--it's easy to rave about the Kotlin-only APIs, the reduced lines of code for both simple and complex UIs, how it's designed for unidirectional data flow (UDF), the growing tooling/community support... However, a quote from the official Why adopt Compose documentation sums it up quite nicely: "There are fewer steps between the thing you want to make and actually making it." I'd wager that this is the "north star" of Compose (and any UI toolkit for that matter): making it easier to implement what your product team--whether that's you as an indie developer or an entire team of designers--has envisioned. Compose is very good at doing this in most cases but, in my opinion, it could be better in one particular, important area: design systems. Why are design systems important in the context of Compose? Before we dive in: If you need an introduction to or a refresher on design systems, Figma has conveniently started publishing a series on the topic starting with Design systems 101: What is a design system? I also recommend checking out designsystems.com (also by Figma) and reading Design That Scales by Dan Mall. Design systems are the "secret sauce" (of truth) for UIs at scale. Just as Compose seems to be the UI-toolkit-shaped silver bullet for Android development (and possibly other platforms), design systems have the same sleek, shiny casing in the world of product design, and they're here to stay. Your aforementioned pr ## MAD Skills Material Design Components: Wrap-Up DevFeed: [MAD Skills Material Design Components: Wrap-Up]() Original publisher: [Read original article]() Author: Nick Rout Published: 2020-12-11T18:01:17Z Content type: article Language: en Sources: [Stories by Nick Rout on Medium]() Topics: [Material Design](), [Android](), [android-development](), [Library](), [Dark Mode](), [Jetpack Compose]() Tags: [android](), [android-app-development](), [android-development](), [androiddev](), [jetpack-compose](), [mad-skills](), [material-components](), [material-design](), [material-theming](), [tutorial](), [ui]() ### AI overview This wrap-up completes the third MAD Skills series topic on Material Design Components (MDC) for Modern Android Development. It points readers to videos, articles, sample apps, and codelabs covering Material Theming, Dark Theme, Motion, Jetpack Compose interoperability, and Android Studio template updates. ### Source excerpt We hope you liked our materialIt's a wrap_content! The third topic in the MAD Skills series of videos and articles on Modern Android Development is complete. This time around we covered Material Design Components (a.k.a MDC). This library provides the Material Components as Android widgets and makes it easy to implement design patterns seen on material.io, such as Material Theming, Dark Theme, and Motion. Check out the episodes and links below to see what we covered. We designed these videos to closely follow our recent series of MDC articles as well as existing sample apps and codelabs, so you've got a variety of ways to engage with the content. We also had a Q&A episode featuring engineers from the MDC team! Episode 1: Why use MDC? The first episode by Nick Butcher is an overview video of this entire MAD Skills series, including why we recommend MDC, then deep-dives on Material Theming, Dark Theme and Motion. It also covers MDC interop with Jetpack Compose and updates to Android Studio templates that include MDC and themes/styles best practices. https://medium.com/media/79d74fd1bad21a94fc28742b3402afd9/href Or in article form: We Recommend Material Design Components Episode 2: Material Theming Episode 2 by Nick Rout covers Material Theming and goes through a tutorial on how to implement it on Android using MDC. Key topics include setting up a Theme.MaterialComponents.* app theme, choosing color, type, and shape attributes -- using tools on material.io -- and finally adding them to your theme to see how widgets automatically react and adapt their UI. Also covered are handy utility classes that MDC provides for certain scenarios, like resolving theme color attributes and applying shape to images. https://medium.com/media/d41aaddc87de1854e840265d07ed1ad6/href Or in article form: Material Theming with MDC: Color Material Theming with MDC: Type Material Theming with MDC: Shape Episode 3: Dark Theme This episode by Chris Banes gets really dark... It takes you through implem ## Material Theming with MDC: Type DevFeed: [Material Theming with MDC: Type]() Original publisher: [Read original article]() Author: Nick Rout Published: 2020-08-25T16:03:24Z Content type: tutorial Language: en Sources: [Stories by Nick Rout on Medium]() Topics: [material-components](), [Material Design](), [Android](), [Library](), [User interface design]() Tags: [android](), [code](), [components](), [design](), [material-components](), [material-design](), [material-theming](), [migration-guide](), [typography](), [usability]() ### AI overview This tutorial explains type theming for Android apps using the Material Components (MDC) library. It describes Material Design's 13 type styles, their baseline properties, how MDC type attributes style widget text, and how to select type styles for different interface elements. ### Source excerpt Type theming on Android using the MDC library This article is also posted on the Material Design blog. Material Theming is a way to customize Material Components to align with your brand. A Material theme includes color, typography and shape parameters which you can adjust to get near-infinite variations of the components -- all while maintaining their core anatomy and usability. On Android, Material Theming can be implemented using the Material Components (MDC) library, from version 1.1.0 onwards. If you're looking to migrate from the Design Support Library or MDC 1.0.0, take a look at our migration guide. Migrating to Material Components for Android This article will be focusing on type theming. Type attributes Material Design provides 13 type "styles" that are applied to all the text in your app. Each of these have a design term (eg. "Body 1") along with a corresponding type attribute that can be overridden in your app theme (eg. textAppearanceBody1). There are default "baseline" values (text size, letter spacing, capitalization, etc.) for each style. MDC type attributes with baseline styling Material Components use these type attributes to style textual elements of the widgets (those parts that subclass or comprise one or more TextViews). Type attributes used by a button They are applied with eg. android:textAppearance="?attr/textAppearanceBody1" in layouts and widget styles. Take a look at Nick Butcher's "What's your text's appearance?" article for more information on using this and the order of precedence with other styling techniques. What's your text's appearance? In the MDC themes these attributes map to styles, eg.