Support

The Design System team provides support for designers, developers, project managers, or anyone who is using the system. See below for various ways to reach us.

Contact us

• Slack: Ask quick questions in our #design-system channel. This is for those with access to U-M Library IT Slack.
• Email: Send us an email at library-design-system-team@umich.edu and we will respond as quickly as possible.

Design System team

The team is responsible for making sure that contributions to the system are of a high quality and meet our needs to build U-M Library websites.

• Jon Earley (Design System Lead), User Interface Design Engineer
• Bridget Burke, Front-end Developer and Accessibility Specialist
• Roger Espinosa, Application Programmer/Analyst Senior
• Ellen Schlegelmilch, User Interface User Experience Designer

Contribution criteria

The Design System team considers the following when evaluating contributions.

Useful - There is evidence that it would be useful for many (at least 3) websites, web teams, or services.

Unique - It has value and doesn’t replicate something that already exists in the Design System. If it’s intended to replace an existing contribution, then there is evidence to show that it’s better.

Design System principles

A set of principles underpins all our design decisions and guides us when we need to make hard choices. This criteria is what makes good design at U-M Library and all design patterns are evaluated against it.

1. Backed by research

Understanding user needs is central. Our design, development, and content efforts must be based on what real users need — what they need to do, what they need to know, and what challenges they may need to overcome. Decisions will be informed by research and by best practices and standards.

2. Simple

Less is more. Our visual style is clean and understated. We help users stay focused by using subtle, unobtrusive graphics, standard controls, and predictable behaviors. We offer users a well thought-out path, rather than overwhelming them with choices.

3. Robust

Anyone should be able to understand and use our interfaces. Our sites are intuitive, flexible, and resilient. And when we say ‘anyone’, we mean it. Our products and visual language should be welcoming and accessible for all users, regardless of their age, gender, or device.

Accessibility

Anyone should be able to understand how our websites work without instruction. The products and services we create should be accessible for all people, regardless of their mental or physical abilities.

Every component aims to be compliant with WCAG 2.1 (Level A and AA).

Browser support

We guarantee browser support for the latest two versions for Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge, and Opera. Critical bug fixes in earlier versions will be addressed based on their severity and impact.