Evaluating Existing CSS
Here are some things to consider when evaluating existing CSS:
- Are there other (known) things coming down the pipe that might make use of this?
- Are there 'positional' things that we already have code for?
- Evaluate as you go along. The first pass may produce the desired UI but it's often not as good as it could be. Too often we stop writing and evaluating at this point.
- Check property values. Are the values 'balanced'? Here are some examples:
margin: 0 -6px 2px 11px;
- if values are unbalanced, ask why. Always ask why.
This kind of imbalance is usually a symptom of some larger systemic ill.
Sometimes it can be reasonable, but needs to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
- Have
font-family
or font-size
been duplicated where it may have intially made sense, but something more enduring may have satisfied the condition? (it's common for this to happen when styling <input>
elements)
- What could My Designer(s) ask for within the next [reasonable-frame-of-time, maybe it's a year, maybe it's not] that we might want to accomodate?
- examples: colorscheme, font-family, different [custom] form control styles, different [active] indicators, different icon set.
- "[We want to do a test | We did some A/B testing, and...] All of the text in the 'Chrome' should be 2px larger."