Crafting a Community-Driven UI Library: A Guide to Fostering Collaboration and Adoption
Empower your UI library by boosting open-source / InnerSource community engagement
Creating a UI component library can be a monumental yet rewarding endeavor, especially when approached with community collaboration at its core. A well-constructed UI library not only provides a suite of components that are essential for building consistent and efficient interfaces, but it also acts as a cornerstone for fostering community engagement — be it through an open-source model or an InnerSource approach within larger organizations.
By designing a UI library that encourages wide adoption, you invite feedback, bug fixes, and contributions, thereby enhancing your library’s quality and adaptability.
Let’s explore strategic steps to build a UI library that not only meets developers' needs but also thrives on community interaction. This interaction cultivates an ecosystem where customization and extensions flourish, transforming the library into a living project that continually evolves through its users' collective expertise and creativity.
Whether “community” refers to global open-source contributors or cross-functional teams within an organization, the principles of collaboration and shared ownership remain key to unlocking the full potential of any UI library.
Avoid “mega libraries” — maintain and publish individual components
Avoid “mega libraries” that include UI components and utilities in a single package. Instead, a “UI library” should consist of small independent packages that are released independently and can be installed individually.
Modern tools like Bit make packaging and releasing individual components incredibly easy. Packages require no configuration. Their dependencies are automatically detected and intelligently resolved to the proper versions and types.
As a bonus, Bit also auto-generates documentation for each component and makes it extremely easy to showcase the component in a standalone setup.
The freedom to pick and choose components and avoid meaningless updates
Consumers should be able to pick and choose components and component versions. They should be able to get updates only when these updates affect their project. New releases of a component that a project does not use shouldn't affect it.
Lowering the risk of new updates
Modularity also reduces the risk of introducing breaking changes to a stable system when only a part of the library needs to be updated. This strategy aligns with the principles of semantic versioning (major.minor.patch ), where version numbers are meaningful and indicate the nature of changes.
In addition, smaller, independent packages can be version-controlled more effectively, allowing for a clear history of changes and easier rollback to previous versions if needed.
Encourage community contributions
A UI library maintained as independent modules is easier to understand and maintain. This makes it more accessible for new contributors who may want to add features, fix bugs, or improve documentation for individual components without having to navigate a monolithic codebase.
A ‘user’ of a component from your library can quickly become a ‘contributor’ by importing the Bit component to his/her project, making the changes, and creating a new ‘change request.’
Design for extensibility and composability
Component interfaces should allow for customization and extension, enabling developers to modify and enhance components to suit their needs without altering the source code.
Component attributes and styles should be overridable to a certain extent. Offering a very limited interface that does not allow for any customization creates an “all-or-nothing” situation where you, as a maintainer, are not able to use the component interface as effectively as you might want.
Instead, a balance should be struck between providing developers with enough flexibility to inject custom functionality or styles and maintaining the component's core aesthetic and functional integrity.
Components should be context-aware and themeable. Context providers can supply data to components deep in the component tree without passing props through every level. This is useful for themes, localization, or any other global data.
/** an example of a theme component */
import { createTheme } from '@teambit/base-react.theme.theme-provider';
import { defaultDesignTokenValues } from './design-tokens.js';
/* generate a theme using the design token default values */
export const MyTheme = createTheme({
theme: defaultDesignTokenValues,
});
/* create a theme schema to standardize future theme extensions */
export type ThemeSchema = typeof defaultDesignTokenValues;Context providers are another strategy that aims to achieve customization with minimal impact on the core library. To make the most of it, make those context providers extensible and customizable, as well. For example, a UI library should offer a default theme that allows others to override its properties or extend them with new ones.
Components should offer “slots” or “hooks” that allow inserting custom functionality or content, ensuring that components can be reused in different contexts. By following a plugin architecture, libraries can provide a basic set of functionalities while allowing additional features to be added as needed.
/** an example of a button component with a pluggable spinner */
import { Spinner as DefaultSpinner, type SpinnerProps} from '@spinner-package-name';
interface ButtonProps {
spinner?: ComponentType<SpinnerProps>;
}
const Button = ({ spinner: Spinner = DefaultSpinner }: ButtonProps) => {
const SpinnerComponent = spinner;
return (
<button>
Click me
<SpinnerComponent />
</button>
);
};Drive wider adoption
A UI library can meet a broader range of developer needs by supporting plugins. Developers are more likely to adopt a library that they can easily customize to fit the specific requirements of their projects. The ability to add custom or third-party plugins without altering the core library enables more tailored and precise solutions.
Create an ecosystem for plugins and extensions
When a library supports plugins, it opens up opportunities for the community to contribute. Developers can extend the library’s capabilities by creating and sharing their own plugins. A vibrant community ecosystem around a library often leads to greater visibility, more robust testing, and faster improvements, all of which attract more users.
