diagram-design skill

Diagram Design

Create diagrams as self-contained HTML files with inline SVG and an editorial design system.

Forty-one visual types. Semantic patterns describe behavior; type references describe layout.

0. First-time setup — style guide gate

Before generating your first diagram in a new project, verify the style guide has been customized.

Do not silently ship default-skinned diagrams into a branded project.

First resolve any project .diagram-design marker per references/profiles.md; a successfully resolved marker selects its profile and bypasses this gate. That reference owns failures, the protected default, and save behavior.

Open references/style-guide.md and check the default tokens. If they are still the shipped defaults (paper #f5f5f5, ink #2d3142, accent #eb6c36), pause and ask the user:

"This is your first diagram in this project and the style guide is still default. Customize now? Options: (a) website URL, (b) installed skill, (c) local folder/design-system, (d) paste tokens, (e) keep default, (f) load saved profile."

Then branch per the matching section of references/onboarding.md; for (f) follow references/profiles.md.

Once the style guide has been customized (or the user explicitly chose default), skip this gate on later runs. A leading profile header names the copied-in active profile. Without a header, any semantic-role value or typography family differing from shipped defaults means custom-unsaved: skip the gate and offer to save it as a profile. All-default tokens with no marker/header trigger the gate. After onboarding, offer to save as a named client profile per references/profiles.md.

1. Philosophy

The highest-quality move is usually deletion.

Applied to schematics:

• Every node represents a distinct idea. Two nodes that always travel together are one node.
• Every connection carries information. If the relationship is obvious from layout, remove the line.
• Coral is editorial, not a flag. 1–2 focal nodes per diagram. Using it on 5 nodes erases the signal.
• The schematic isn't done when everything is added. It's done when nothing can be removed.

Target density: 4/10. Enough to be technically complete. Not so dense it needs a guide. Above 9 nodes, it's probably two diagrams.

2. When to Use

Use for any of the 41 visual types (§3) when a reader will learn more from a visual than from prose, a table, or a bulleted list.

Don't use for:

• Quick unicode diagrams → use wiretext.
• Lists of things → table or bullets.
• Simple before/after → table.
• One-shape "diagrams" → just write the sentence.

Before drawing, ask: Would the reader learn more from this than from a well-written paragraph? If no, don't draw.

3. Selection: semantic pattern, then visual type

When behavior, state, enforcement, or risk carries the meaning, first load references/semantic-patterns.md and choose one primary pattern. Then choose the nearest visual type for layout. If no pattern matches, choose the type directly.

The pattern owns semantic primitives and its tighter budget; the type owns layout grammar. Use references/animation.md only when motion is requested or materially clarifies ordered change; static remains the default.

Visual-type guide (41)

Rules of thumb:

• If a 3-column table communicates the same thing, pick the table.
• If two types seem useful, pick the dominant axis; a semantic pattern may add behavior-specific primitives, not a second layout grammar.
• If you're past the complexity budget (§7), split into an overview + detail.

Always load the chosen type reference linked in the guide before drawing. When routed above, also load semantic-patterns.md; when animation is chosen, load animation.md.

Confirm before drawing

Before rendering, state the plan in one short message: the chosen visual type (and semantic pattern, if routed), the size preset, and anything the complexity budget (§7) will force out. If the user is reachable, let them redirect before you draw; if not, proceed and note the assumptions beside the deliverable. Skip the pause only when the request already pins type, size, and content exactly.

4. Universal Anti-patterns

These mark "AI slop" schematics of any type:

Type-specific anti-patterns live in each type reference linked in the guide.

5. Design System

The design system is skinnable. All colors, typography, and tokens live in a single source of truth — references/style-guide.md. This file describes semantic roles (paper, ink, muted, accent, link, …). The default skin is a cool editorial palette (white-smoke paper, jet-black ink, atomic-tangerine accent, blue-slate muted, silver hairlines); to apply your own brand, either edit style-guide.md directly or run the URL-based flow described in references/onboarding.md.

When specs below or in type references mention "ink", "accent", "muted", etc., look up the current hex value in style-guide.md.

Semantic roles (at a glance)

Focal rule: accent goes on 1–2 elements max. Everything else is ink / muted / soft. If you're tempted to accent 4 things, you haven't decided what's focal yet.

Node type → treatment

Typography (summary — full spec in style-guide.md)

• Title — Instrument Serif, 1.75rem, 400 — H1 only
• Node name — Geist (sans), 12px, 600 — human-readable labels
• Sublabel — Geist Mono, 9px — ports, URLs, field types
• Eyebrow / tag — Geist Mono, 7–8px, uppercase, tracked — type tags, axis labels
• Arrow label — Geist Mono, 8px — annotation on arrows
• Editorial aside — Instrument Serif italic, 14px — callouts only

Non-Latin labels — extend the family: Korean, Chinese, Cyrillic.

Mono is for technical content only — never as a blanket "dev" font, and never JetBrains Mono.

<link href="https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Instrument+Serif:ital@0;1&family=Geist:wght@400;500;600&family=Geist+Mono:wght@400;500;600&family=Noto+Serif:ital@0;1&family=Noto+Sans+KR:wght@400;500;600&family=Noto+Serif+KR:wght@400&family=Noto+Sans+TC:wght@400;500;600&family=Noto+Serif+TC:wght@400&display=swap" rel="stylesheet">

6. Core SVG Primitives

Universal building blocks. Type-specialized primitives (lifeline, activation bar, region) live in the relevant type reference linked in the guide. Optional primitives:

• Editorial callouts → primitive-annotation.md
• Hand-drawn variant → primitive-sketchy.md
• Icon set (laptop, server, DB, K8s, Docker, AWS, …) → primitive-icons.md. Browse the gallery at assets/icons.html.
• Terminal / CLI-window variant → primitive-terminal.md
• Optional explanatory motion → animation.md

Background

Default: clean paper, no dot pattern. Single filled with paper. Don't wrap the diagram in a secondary container background — the diagram sits directly on the page.

<rect width="100%" height="100%" fill="#f5f5f5"/>

Optional: dotted paper variant. When a long-form editorial diagram benefits from textured ground (essays, hero diagrams on a dedicated page), opt in by adding the dots pattern and a second rect:

<defs>
  <pattern id="dots" width="22" height="22" patternUnits="userSpaceOnUse">
    <circle cx="1" cy="1" r="0.9" fill="rgba(45,49,66,0.10)"/>
  </pattern>
</defs>
<rect width="100%" height="100%" fill="#f5f5f5"/>
<rect width="100%" height="100%" fill="url(#dots)" opacity="0.6"/>

Don't use the dot pattern when the diagram sits inside a product page, slide, or card — the texture compounds with surrounding chrome and reads as noise.

Arrow markers (define all three, always)

<marker id="arrow" markerWidth="8" markerHeight="6" refX="7" refY="3" orient="auto">
  <polygon points="0 0, 8 3, 0 6" fill="#4f5d75"/>
</marker>
<marker id="arrow-accent" markerWidth="8" markerHeight="6" refX="7" refY="3" orient="auto">
  <polygon points="0 0, 8 3, 0 6" fill="#eb6c36"/>
</marker>
<marker id="arrow-link" markerWidth="8" markerHeight="6" refX="7" refY="3" orient="auto">
  <polygon points="0 0, 8 3, 0 6" fill="#2e5aa8"/>
</marker>

Draw arrows before boxes so z-order puts lines behind nodes.

Mandatory connector rules

These six rules are non-negotiable. Run the pre-output checklist (§9) to verify before producing any diagram.

1. Rounded right-angle (orthogonal) connectors are mandatory. Never use diagonal or straight slanted paths between nodes that don't share an x or y axis. Every bend must be a quarter-arc with r=8 (or r=6 minimum for tight layouts). See references/type-architecture.md for the elbow-path formula. Reserve plain straight only for connections whose endpoints share the same x or y coordinate. Diagonal connectors are an automatic fail.

1. Label-to-connector margin: 6–10px gap, always. A label must never sit on its arrow — the connector must remain visible. Place the label centered above (or beside, for vertical segments) the line with a minimum 6px gap between the bottom of the label's mask rect and the connector stroke. The opaque mask rect prevents the arrow from bleeding through, but the visible gap between mask edge and line preserves the reader's ability to trace the connection. If the label is large enough that 6px feels cramped, push it to 8–10px. Never let the mask rect touch or overlap the stroke.