How UI Designers & UI Developers should work together?
Traditionally, designers aren’t great developers, and vice versa. There are many exceptions, but generally the art of one group is a mystery to the other — yet they routinely have to collaborate on projects. Organisation value designers who knows how to code and developers who care about design.
The relationship between good designer and developers is the most important thing to have for a successful project.
The Collaboration
If you want to make your project a big success then it is necessary to start it with a clear communication. UI Developers and UI Designers must have to put the project in front of them first, then think about the big picture and make decisions and process. This is the phase where you will win as well as lose some fights.
- Right from the point of ideation, the Distilled designers and developers start a conversation about how the piece could potentially work, what technologies would be involved and what (if any) restraints these would put on the design team.
- When the initial design stage is complete, the designer will have a handover briefing with the developer where they talk over the typography, the interactive elements, the responsive elements and any graphics that are featured.
- When Developers working with data, then they should supply real samples if possible. Knowing the data ranges developers trapping in their code can be useful for designers to know too. Designers also need to know things like screen sizes and browser compatibility from the start.
- Decide on who will be supplying graphics — will the designer provide separate files with images or will the developer pull them from the Illustrator file themselves. Deciding on naming conventions for files at this point is also helpful as renaming multiple files is an unnecessary irritation.
- Name different file versions so that the latest version or the one you want to be used is easily found. Maintain the layers in image assets, naming them usefully and grouping them whenever you can.
Advantages of working together
- More creative design and brainstorming.
- Merges ideas for a more rounded vision of what a project is supposed to be.
- A more unified finished product.
- You will learn something about how development/design works.
- Further focus on the goals and mission of the project.
I believe, working in a team of designers & developers is not much different than other similar jobs. At the core you need to respect your teammates and help them through any obstacles. At the end of the day both jobs have a singular goal: To create a phenomenal website.
Thank you!
I am a Head — User Experience at Reliance Jio Cloud Services, A Cloud Computing Service Provider from India. You can often find me writing about UX Design and Cloud Computing on Twitter @vickynimbalkar and @indiauiux
Disclaimer: All images are copyright to their respective owners.*
