Brad Frost wrote recently an article about Frontend design and after read it I thought, yes, this is what I am! I am a Frontend Designer!

He says that Frontend Design involves creating the HTML, CSS, and presentational JavaScript code that makes up a user interface, but it also helps bridge the divide between the design and development worlds because we know the basis of them.

• I have a past as a backend developer, so I know it works.

• I also create AngularJS applications, so in my case I am learning to write application-level JavaScript and not only presentational Javascript.

• I am doing a graphic design course, so I can start comparing color palettes or create basic illustrations and icons.

• But do I understand UX principles and best practices? I don’t.

It is not that I want to be a Full-stack designer, but it would be useful if I know the UX basis just in case I need it. Or to understand better a design that I’m going to transform in code.

As the article What is a Full-stack designer, and should you be one? said, the benefits of expanding our skill sets are quite nice. Full-stack designers often end up with a more thorough understanding of their work, making it more consistent from research to production phases. Knowing the limitations and what to expect in development, while planning UX/UI wireframes or mockups, can keep concepts realistic.

Although Full-stack design would be nice, I think it is not necessary. I can focus in web design to improve myself as a Frontend Designer, but I can come closer to UX to understand better the whole process.

Brad Frost also points out that Frontend development should be a core part of the design process. We don’t have to forget that we work on the same user interface.

An article of UXPA magazine, Building it Right! Bridging the Gap Between UX Designers and Developers brings us the same idea, that it should be more cooperation between UX and Frontend Design. While the UX designers extract and translate the user requirements into user-friendly wireframes, Frontend designers convert those wireframes into real products. Since each role requires a different educational background, the two players sometimes find themselves in conflict with one another due to differing beliefs.

To bridge the gap between these two points of view, the UXPA invited three Frontend designers to present their point of view to a local audience of UX professionals. They spoke about bringing the Frontend designers to the conceptualization phase. Frontend designers can also bring technical ways to improve the interaction and working together can increase trust and confidence with each other.

In my case I can’t start to do this approach at work right now, we don’t have UX team currently. But I can start learning by my own, hopefully I will start to understand more the whole process and use it for my personal projects as well.

By the way, next week it will be the first Women Techmakers Madrid and one talk is about these issues. I am looking forward to hearing what they are going to say. The title is “War of the Worlds: designers and developers” by Laura Andina and Josefina Pérez.