Boxes And Arrows : The Design Behind the Design

Article Idea:

Managing Control Libraries

suggested by James Morrison on 2006/03/15

Hi All,

I work as a Visual Designer for a large software firm. We have a rather bloated library of controls to manage. (Buttons, Table, Input fields, Progress trackers, Toolbars, Tree etc etc) and no clear system in place.

We need to view and often design these controls alongside each other so to maintain visual consistency (so we have a master control sheet of all of these in a PSD)
, yet we also have various versions of each control that continues to evolve and go through a series of iterations and changes single psds).

We also have to throw together mock-ups/use cases very often, which involves customizing the latest iteration of the control (button text & length for example).

We have no system in place for Version control as to which of the controls is the most current, and as a result, mock ups often contain outdated controls, the master control sheet goes out of date if not carefully maintained and we have various versions of the single control PSD’s & spec docs floating around our server.

My thought as of late, was to try and get completely inside an Adobe workflow, using Version Cue to keep just one file updated and monitor permissions, then collating our single psds (as links) into a master illustrator document to take the place of the master control sheet. And attempt to keep a filing strategy that separates any edits to a control for mock-up purposes from the elemental control definition.

We also need to link these iterations & changes with documentation and notes as to whats changed, who’s done it, where its headed etc.. And being able to sort these into groups would be nice too :) (alphabetical, Floorplan, Buttons etc)

That’s it in a nutshell, but far from a complete overview of the issue.

Basically I’m looking for an article that addresses these issues and how other firms control what I imagine are similar issues in this department.

Many thanks for your time,
Jim