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Design Fundamentals for Developers - 5 Tips that Help You Pretend You Know What You're Doing

Lukas Mauser on May 27, 2025

I am not a designer myself, but for the better part of the last decade, I've been involved in a lot of frontend projects and worked closely with de...
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Jonas Scholz

"good artists borrow, great artists steal"

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Lukas Mauser

Don't know how borrow works in this context but I guess there is some truth to that 😃

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Maria

Great read!
One thing I’d add is the importance of design systems—even a lightweight one can help maintain consistency and reduce decision fatigue. I mean defining a collection of reusable components, guidelines, and standards that help teams build consistent, cohesive user interfaces

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Lukas Mauser

Yes! It sure helps to have some guidelines! The Germans say „if multiple chefs cook together the food will be too salty“

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Yana Zahoruiko

I remember reading a book, "Steal Like an Artist," which works for creative people and for devs as well. Observation is our everything; the more great designs you observe, the better taste you will have 😀.

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Lukas Mauser

Yeah that stealing thing is important - but equally important to be able to find the stolen stuff when you need it 😃

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CODENAMESOL3NYA

Wow, i really needed this. Don't reinvent the wheel just use it.😁

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Lukas Mauser

Yes, I need to remind myself constantly 😃

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Nathan Tarbert

pretty cool seeing someone just say keep it boring-first tbh, makes me wonder - you ever feel torn between playing it safe or pushing your own twist even before you’re an expert?

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Lukas Mauser • Edited

The force is strong within me. But every now and then a non boring component catches me. These 3D animated globes are really tempting and hard to ignore

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(Not mine, Source: reddit.com/r/threejs/comments/oydq...)

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Dotallio

Love these - breaking things down and choosing one main action per section has saved me so many headaches.
Curious, which design rule do you let yourself break first once you’re comfortable with the basics?

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Lukas Mauser

I'll leave that to the designers :-)

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Nevo David

Pretty cool honestly, I always end up overthinking layouts way too much. Sometimes just sticking to the basics keeps me sane.

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Lukas Mauser

Trying new things is always tempting though 👀

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David Inchenko

cool visual