Version control

Tutorial Breakdown

As your libraries grow and evolve over time, keeping track of changes as well as what’s current can become a critical challenge. That’s why we’ve equipped DSM with some of the most powerful versioning features you’ll find in a design system platform.

As the system matures, it’s common for teams to work from an official release version, that’s separate from the Draft — until it’s time to release the next new version and so on.

Versioning keeps your team moving forward and allows for agility and predictability at scale — without risk or compromise.

Let’s look at versioning in DSM works.

Transcript

As your libraries grow and evolve over time, keeping track of changes as well as what’s current can become a critical challenge. That’s why we’ve equipped DSM with some of the most powerful versioning features you’ll find in a design system platform.

Let’s look at versioning in DSM works.

As an Editor or Admin, any new changes to the system live in a staging environment called the Draft. Changes to the draft are immediately available to people viewing the Draft on the web — as well as any designers working with the Draft in Sketch.

Members of your team may spend more time in the Draft when your team is small, and when the frequency of changes is high, typically at the initial phases of setting up a new design system.

As the system matures, it’s common for teams to work from an official release version, that’s separate from the Draft — until it’s time to release the next new version and so on.

You can release a new version of your system at any time from the web — or from the Sketch plugin — by clicking “Release new version”.

This launches a web page to give the new version a name and add context about what’s changed in this version — when you’re ready, click “Release version” and you’re done.

Everyone with access to the design system will be notified that a new version is available — and can choose to switch to it immediately.

Designers can easily switch or roll back versions at any time from the Version History tab of the sketch plugin. This updates the Sketch Libraries associated with the design system — so Sketch will allow you to decide if you want these changes to apply to any existing documents.

Admins and Editors can continue iterating and evolving within the Draft — without concerning the rest of the team with every little unofficial change.

To manage the version history and track changes from the web, you can click the current version name in the top left corner — then choose “Version history”.

From the ellipses next to a version name — you’ll be able to view — or revert to that version.

Before doing so, you can also click to compare any changes made from the previous version. Here you’ll find a visual summary of any items added, removed, or changed in the design system.

Versioning keeps your team moving forward and allows for agility and predictability at scale — without risk or compromise.

Transformative collaboration for all the work you do