
U.S. Web Design System 2.0 - soheilpro
https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/whats-new/updates/2019/04/08/introducing-uswds-2-0/
======
lloydatkinson
Almost an exact copy of the UK governments version of this: [https://design-
system.service.gov.uk/](https://design-system.service.gov.uk/)

~~~
petepete
Some of the markup is incredibly similar. The checkbox stuff[0] looks like a
`s/govuk/usa/g`.

I've been working on a GDS project for the last few months, it's actually a
nice change to have a set of established patterns to work to and a host of
responsive people to discuss extending those patterns with.

[0] [https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/components/form-
controls...](https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/components/form-
controls/#checkbox)

------
mu_killnine
As an enterprise software developer who makes software for 'internal'
customers, I've not really had to address the issue of accessibility. However,
I find this really neat and hope I can be more mindful about it moving
forward.

Pretty neat to see how much effort was put into this.

~~~
dccoolgai
Even for internal apps, it might pay to think about accessibility... e.g.
imagine someone who got hired to use the "internal app" was a Marine vet who
lost vision to an IED or something... if your company is following the law,
you have to provide the same opportunity for him to work there and use that
"internal" app as everyone else. Maybe there's some reason why that would
never be the case, but devs tend to think of the issue of accessibility much
too narrowly.

~~~
vbezhenar
We need easily accessible tools. I used to ignore mobile viewport sizes. Now
Chrome has button to emulate smartphone or iPad. I can check my web page with
a single click. So I often spend a bit of time to ensure that it at least
works good enough in mobile. I did not see anything comparable for blind
users. If Chrome developers would add something similar to their developer
console, I bet, a lot of new pages will be checked.

~~~
wuz
There is an incredibly full-featured accessibility audit in Chrome's dev
tools:

[https://developers.google.com/web/tools/chrome-
devtools/acce...](https://developers.google.com/web/tools/chrome-
devtools/accessibility/reference)

On top of that, there are a _lot_ of Chrome extensions to do all sorts of
great things to help you test for accessibility:

ChromeVox -
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/chromevox/kgejglhp...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/chromevox/kgejglhpjiefppelpmljglcjbhoiplfn?hl=en)

Colorblinding -
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/colorblinding/dgbg...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/colorblinding/dgbgleaofjainknadoffbjkclicbbgaa?hl=en)

aXe -
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/axe/lhdoppojpmngad...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/axe/lhdoppojpmngadmnindnejefpokejbdd)

Color Contrast Testing - [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/color-
contrast-ana...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/color-contrast-
analyzer/dagdlcijhfbmgkjokkjicnnfimlebcll)

No Coffee -
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/nocoffee/jjeeggmbn...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/nocoffee/jjeeggmbnhckmgdhmgdckeigabjfbddl)

HeadingsMap -
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/headingsmap/flbjom...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/headingsmap/flbjommegcjonpdmenkdiocclhjacmbi?hl=en)

Wave -
[https://wave.webaim.org/extension/](https://wave.webaim.org/extension/)

ARIA Validator - [https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/aria-
validator/oig...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/aria-
validator/oigghlanfjgnkcndchmnlnmaojahnjoc?hl=en)

\---

Lack of tools is definitely _not_ the issue.

------
tlrobinson
I'm linking to the recent HN post about Uber's "Based Web" so we can form a
linked list of design systems:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19758848](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19758848)
(see insomniacity's comment there for a bunch more)

~~~
MayeulC
Also see
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18900946](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18900946)
for a similar list (the Australian pendant to this new). I think there was a
post about France's, and maybe other non-English-speaking countries, but
couldn't find them.

I dislike the fact that only the left half of my screen is used on that web
page; the content should at least be centered.

------
KeenFox
Related: the US government has its own font. The page mentions it further
down.

[https://public-sans.digital.gov/](https://public-sans.digital.gov/)

Discussion of the font on HN:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19607371](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19607371)

~~~
velcrovan
This font is even more interesting because it of its extremely uncertain
copyright/licensing situation:

“Open-source licenses, like all software licenses, are only possible through
assertion of copyright. Certain free-software advocates prefer to sidestep
this inconvenient fact (akin to ‘keep your government hands off my Medicare’).
For individual software authors, this usually poses no problem, because their
copyright arises at the moment the work is created. Thus, they’re free to put
their work under any license, including an open-source license.

“But US government employees are a special case. As a matter of federal law
(17 USC § 105), they can’t assert copyright in their work. Public Sans is an
inseparable mixture of copyrighted work (= the underlying Libre Franklin font)
and uncopyrightable work (= the alterations made by the GSA). The GSA
currently claims that Public Sans has been released under the OFL. But that’s
impossible. To use this license, they’d first need to have a copyright in
their contributions. But they don’t.”

— Matthew Butterick (type designer + lawyer)
[https://tinyletter.com/mbutterick/letters/the-curious-
case-o...](https://tinyletter.com/mbutterick/letters/the-curious-case-of-
public-sans-billionaire-s-typewriter-update)

~~~
acdha
His position is not common and there's a long history of U.S. government
lawyers approving participation in open-source projects under licenses which
are not the public domain — e.g. SELinux is under the GPL because the original
Linux kernel was and the NSA's lawyers approved that contribution.

Here's the upstream issue:

[https://github.com/uswds/public-
sans/issues/30](https://github.com/uswds/public-sans/issues/30)

He also opened a separate issue claiming an Establishment clause violation
because the OFL was created by
[https://www.sil.org/about](https://www.sil.org/about):

[https://github.com/uswds/public-
sans/issues/31](https://github.com/uswds/public-sans/issues/31)

~~~
velcrovan
I am aware of the Github issue and in fact Matthew has addressed your SELinux
point in that discussion. He agrees that if the original font had been
licensed under the GPL there would not be an issue here. But the language of
the SIL OFL is different than (and incompatible with) the GPL, so the outcome
is not automatically the same. And the OSI (the OFL licence's FSF-equivalent)
takes the position that public domain and open source don't mix.

~~~
acdha
Yes, he restated his belief that the U.S. government cannot participate in
non-public domain open source projects but he hasn't addressed why so many
government lawyers do not share that opinion.

~~~
velcrovan
Again, he has said his argument is specific to the SIL OFL and not any other
license. The GPL/FSF stuff does not apply to this discussion.

Not sure how he is supposed to have addressed the "lotsa government lawyers
think different" argument when no one in that thread has raised it, let alone
provided any evidence of it. And again, for it to be relevant, these
government lawyer opinions would need to be talking about the OFL
specifically.

~~~
acdha
> Again, he has said his argument is specific to the SIL OFL and not any other
> license. The GPL/FSF stuff does not apply to this discussion.

His claim comes down to the U.S. government not being able to use any license
which relies on copyright claims, which is not unique to OFL. This is why the
government lawyers question is relevant: if he's right, that means that a
bunch of other contributions shouldn't have been allowed unless the projects
are public domain or dual-licensed.

~~~
velcrovan
> His claim comes down to the U.S. government not being able to use any
> license which relies on copyright claims

You haven't read his claim then, he explicitly isn't saying that. He claims
only that the government can't use the OFL because of the specific demands
made by the OFL which the government can't satisfy. FSF licenses don't mind
public domain contributions, the same is not true of the OFL.

~~~
acdha
Please don't accuse people of not having read something because you don't
agree with them.

------
asplake
Is flexbox support sufficiently wide now for public services to adopt it? Or
does it rely on good fallbacks?

~~~
lucideer
Flexbox support is at 98.59% of global users according to[0] (so probably
significantly higher for the US).

[0] [https://caniuse.com/#search=flexbox](https://caniuse.com/#search=flexbox)

~~~
legostormtroopr
98.59% of general users may not be 98.59% of users in government agencies
which is a problem. A lot of users in government agencies are still using
Internet Explorer, which makes this question important depending on the
audience.

If you are building websites for users of government services its probably ok,
if you are building websites for employees of government sites you might have
problems.

~~~
lucideer
Believe it or not, Internet Explorer does support flexbox: both the latest
version, and the version before.

There may be more IE users using government sites (whether they be gov
employees forced to leverage it for ancient intranet use, or just some older
users), but hopefully the number of those on IE <10 will still be extremely
small. Global usage for IE <10 is ~0.3%, which includes many users in Asia
forced to use IE for ActiveX banking; again, one would hope this figure would
be far far lower in the US.

The bulk of that 1.4% of global users without flexbox support are actually
more likely to be on an old version of iOS Safari or pre-Chrome Android
Browser, than on IE, and desktop would be a larger-than-elsewhere demographic
within older users of gov sites, and within gov employees on gov workstations,
so in reality the flexbox support stats could well be above average for gov
sites.

------
Illniyar
I get that government websites need to be accessible more then anything, and
these constraints are obviously more important then the vague and subjective
idea of beauty, but damn some of these components are really ugly:

[https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/components/button/](https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/components/button/)

[https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/components/form-
controls...](https://v2.designsystem.digital.gov/components/form-controls/)

The borders just seems really poor looking for me. The form controls double
borders when in error and focus are so aggressive. No elevations or shadows.
It's flat design to it's radical extreme.

I suppose I've gotten used to beauty being subtle - like a good comedy, if
it's in your face then it isn't very good.

~~~
wlesieutre
I wouldn't say they're ugly, more that they're not trendy. They're round rects
with text on them.

But I don't need my government services to be on the bleeding edge of web
design trends so I think that's fine.

~~~
plopz
The square focus border around the rounded button looks pretty bad to me. I
feel like it should be more consistent, either square the button or round the
focus border.

~~~
wlesieutre
IMO having a focus border that _doesn 't_ look like a page content element is
a feature. You could make it blend in more, but do you really want it to?

------
FlyingGoose
As an international software engineer living in the US, I'd appreciate if
people like Matt Cutts would make an effort towards making non-citizen
developers like me to be able to work at US govt institutions like USDS.

