Figma Blog

Here is a thought you might want to consider and see if it makes sense. This is personal, but I also believe this is where design codes (especially CSS) are going to go.

It is not going to be Tailwind or more new frameworks. Honestly, I think all of these Bootstrap, Foundation, and Tailwind, etc. are like middle-layer abstractions are for designs that are neither small nor large. Bootstrap won because of the out-of-the-box UI designs that looked nice overall, and so did Tailwind. By the way, I love Tailwind's color palette, and I continue to steal from it all the time.

CSS (the actual raw CSS) has become so usable, easy and just works while browsers are so advanced these days, that I don't think we even need to reset/normalize/sanitize the styles.

The tools we need will soon be the ones that will integrate directly with IDEs, akin to how the likes of Figma are going. Imagine a designer either does an overall design or works on modules of components or StyleTiles that are reflected in the CSS either on its own or part of the Javascript-ified HTML markups. When a developer changes something, it is reflected back to the designer's tool so that the designer also knows what changed.

I believe this is where the AI-assisted ones will shine — their ability to bridge the relationship between the design and the code. The interface to interact with that can be the drawing tools (Photoshop, Affinity, Figma) for designers, prompts, or harry's wand (it does not matter).

In fact, for…

I'm creating an open source todo list + calendar webapp (https://getartemis.app, source at https://github.com/satvikpendem/artemis) made by just me, and I can tell you how I approached the problem.

The video you see on the front page does not exist in code, it is simply a prototype designed with Figma (https://figma.com) and animated with Principle (https://principleformac.com). I created the landing page and video, added a Mailchimp form, and I posted on Twitter, Reddit, and here on Hacker News, the communities in which it made sense. For me, it's a productivity / task management tool, so I would post on reddit.com/r/getdisciplined or reddit.com/r/productivity.

It's all about creating a minimum viable product, as you might well be aware, but what you may not know is that an MVP need not have code. Indeed, it could be a video as I did, and I think for software, a video works best as people can actually see what it looks and feels like, without you necessarily creating the product architecture (full frontend and backend plus devops etc). Now I have over 150 subscribers in only a month due to rapid creation of this type of MVP, and based on this feedback, I changed my designs, and only now I am beginning to really create the heart of the product.

Using non-code MVPs is the best way in my opinion to sell quickly before building.

Figma | Security Engineer | Remote or Hybrid (SF, NYC, Seattle) | https://figma.com | Full-Time, $149-350k + Equity

Figma makes the tools that modern companies use to design apps. And because of that highly sensitive data, security is extremely important to get right. (If the next iPhone were designed using Figma and a breach leaked it... yeah, you get the point.)

Anyway, I am on the security team over here at Figma and reminding the excellent HN folks that we're hiring. I'm primarily working on AI and Snowflake Security currently, but I've hopped around over the past year. You likely will too!

We are a bit of a weird hybrid hiring-wise though. We need engineers with a security background than can _also_ write production-grade software.

(If you are a regular SWE then please check out Figma Careers page for a better role to apply for. There are many open roles, though keep in mind that Figma tends to only hire at the "Senior" bar and up. Not very many junior folks here.)

This is the link for my team if you're interested! Feel free to ping me at my email on my profile if you have questions. Cheers!

https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/figma/jobs/4214880004?gh_jid=4214880004

Figma | Desktop Engineering Manager | SF, NYC or Remote in US | Full-time | https://www.figma.com/ | https://boards.greenhouse.io/figma/jobs/4803813004

As the Desktop Engineering Manager at Figma, you will lead the Desktop team responsible for creating the best way for daily Figma users to collaborate, create, and get work done with joy and efficiency through our macOS and Windows applications. You’ll work closely with your team (5 engineers), designers, PMs, and other EMs to enhance and extend our web products so they work seamlessly on desktop.

You’ll also continue building the team so we have the right people to create the best desktop experience for our power users. The ideal leader for this role is excited about getting deep into the details and leveraging their team to bring the best of the web and desktop together.

Contact: Apply at the JD link above, or reach out to pmorey@figma.com if you have any questions!

There is a lot of movement in the offline-first/multiplayer space at the moment, after apps like Linear [1] & Figma [2] have pushed the paradigms.

[1]: https://linear.app
[2]: https://figma.com

Some other projects which will help you implement the pattern that are worth checking out:

Replicache [3] - real-time sync for any backend. Works via simple push and pull end points and is built by a small team of 3 devs with decent browser xp (Greasemonkey, Chrome, etc)

Logux [4] - a client/server framework for collaborative apps. From Evil Martians, well known for: postcss, autoprefixer, browserlist etc.

[3]: https://replicache.dev
[4]: https://logux.io

RoomService also used to be in the space but recently left it to pivot to something else.

The largest problem you’ll end up solving is conflict resolution so having a good understanding of the tradeoffs involved with your (or the underlying) implementation is key.

I remember when I first read this blog post, https://www.figma.com/blog/how-we-built-the-figma-plugin-system/. Besides now feeling a bit old realizing this was 5 years ago, I remember thinking what an amazing engineering culture they must have at Figma (besides having a bunch of brilliant people). I mean, they talked about essentially trying out a tech path for a month and then deciding that path was a dead end - I find this so rare in startups where there is a lot of pressure to continually demonstrate "progress".

As a corollary, though, I think those kinds of cultures are only possible if your team is composed of primarily brilliant people, because these brilliant people can move faster than most competitors even if they do wander down an unproductive path for a while, and there is total trust that the folks on your team are capable and self-motivated.