Design system formats must be open and tool-agnostic to succeed¶
Insight: Onori reacts to "Design System Studio" (a tool for defining design systems in a structured .ds file) with a strong position: the concept of structured design system files is right, but proprietary formats are "dead on arrival." Design systems need open formats, standards, and protocols that can be opened in any tool and managed however teams choose. This reinforces the W3C DTCG spec's importance as the open standard for design tokens.
Detail: Onori also makes the pragmatic case for design systems: while philosophical debates about whether systems help or hurt software continue, design systems remain a net positive because they protect practitioners from fundamental gaps in understanding (e.g., accessibility basics like using <button> instead of <div> for interactive elements).
Sources
Related: existing entry "W3C DTCG spec reaches stability" in batch-7/design-tokens.md — CORROBORATES