Creating a 'playbook' of components for page creators/designers

[fatbaldboy]

Hi,

Has anyone found an effective (and hopefully efficient) way of providing an illustration of the different components/templates available for making pages.  Something where people can (effectively) say "I'd like to use 'that' component at the top, then 'that one' below...and then we'll use 'that component' at the bottom for displaying the x".  I know it's not actually quite that simple - but hopefully that description makes enough sense.

Effectively a catalogue for people to browse - could be UX, could be product owners...whoever it is in your organisation that needs it.

Thanks in advance for any help.

[smacdonald2008]

"Has anyone found an effective (and hopefully efficient) way of providing an illustration of the different components/templates available for making pages."

AEM does not really support this. You can organize your components into categories - but AEM does not have a tool that provides this information.

Another approach is you can document various components that your org uses for such purposes. Maybe create a word doc/PDF that describes the available components and when to use them.  

[Prince_Shivhare]

Hey,

Its a good approach but every time client is having a different requirement for pages.and is it really possible to get all the component information from different projects?

I don't think it is possible. however you can make document for OOTB component which can help in this case.

and as Scott stated, there is no such document or tool that provide this information.

~ Prince

[fatbaldboy]

Prince Shivhare wrote...

Hey,

Its a good approach but every time client is having a different requirement for pages.and is it really possible to get all the component information from different projects?

I don't think it is possible. however you can make document for OOTB component which can help in this case.

and as Scott stated, there is no such document or tool that provide this information.

~ Prince

Thanks both.

I'd assumed there was nothing OOTB but this is the second client I've had (my role is UX) that would like something like this.  We're currently going to remake the components (not every nuance) within a design package (Sketch or Axure) with the hope that we can generate something that is useful for both UX and the wider audience.

With regard keeping track of updates, changes and new components we'll be looking to put some strict governance and regular communication in place to help with this.  It won't eradicate all problems of course but the governance + regular catch-ups should help.

Can anyone describe their process/documentation (inside or outside of AEM) that they use?

[smacdonald2008]

We used to track such changes (to tool components) using a WIKI. 

[fatbaldboy · Accepted solution]

I think we'll probably end up with a couple of solutions serving different needs, maybe:

• Confluence to track changes and component details
• Axure/Sketch for a visual catalogue to browse

[smacdonald2008]

That seems to be the right direction.