Design Systems for Conversational UX

Abstract

Design systems for creating user experience reduce effort, scaffold learning and increase collaboration [2], yet they are currently available primarily for applications with visual interfaces. Design systems for conversational UX are still few and far between. Any design system should provide a distinctive philosophy, interaction patterns and content format. The Alma Design System, from IBM Research, provides these. Its design philosophy takes human conversation as its metaphor and adapts principles from conversation science, such as mutual understanding, recipient design, minimization and repair. Its pattern language provides 100 interaction patterns and components adapted from the literature of Conversation Analysis. It includes formal patterns for conversational activities and their management. And its content format consists of six slots and can be extended to any number of parts.