Nine palettes × twelve OKLCH steps. The 12-step ramp is the spine of the whole system — every post gets its own.
// LIGHTS and CHROMAS are fixed across all palettes. const LIGHTS = [.20 .28 .35 .42 .48 .54 .60 .66 .72 .78 .84 .90] const CHROMAS = [.08 .12 .16 .18 .19 .18 .16 .14 .12 .10 .08 .06] // Hue drifts around the palette's baseHue. hueOffsets = [-HV -0.7HV -0.5HV -0.3HV -0.1HV 0 0.1HV 0.3HV 0.5HV 0.7HV 0.9HV HV] // One-line contrast picker. No WCAG solver needed — the ramp was tuned. text = L > 0.58 ? "#0a0a0a" : "#fff"
themeFor(postId) → { bg, text, strokes, paletteKey, step }.
Deterministic hash of the post id picks one of 108 themes, so a post keeps its color forever.
Plex trio — Serif for display, Sans for UI, Mono for meta. One family, three registers.
Attention is the scarcest resource of the decade.
Why I stopped reading Hacker News and started keeping notes.
A longer opening paragraph, set in italic serif so it reads as voiced, not structural.
This is body text. It sits at 16 / 26 with balanced wrapping, which keeps orphans in check without forcing a narrow measure. Run out a couple of sentences and the line-height still feels generous.
Auxiliary copy — captions, footnotes, the stuff that sits in the margin.
2026-04-20 · 12 min · ben.chien/essays/attention
Essay · Tools for thought
Doubling scale, starts at 4 px. Radii line up with card (20) and toolbar (pill).
| Token | Value | Use |
|---|---|---|
--space-1 | 4px | Hairline gaps |
--space-2 | 8px | Chip padding, tight gaps |
--space-3 | 12px | Toolbar button gap |
--space-4 | 16px | Default paragraph gap |
--space-5 | 24px | Card padding, section breaks |
--space-6 | 32px | Shell padding |
--space-7 | 48px | Hero breathing |
--space-8 | 64px | Between sections |
--space-9 | 96px | Page-level |
--space-10 | 128px | Hero top/bottom |
| Token | Value | Use |
|---|---|---|
--radius-sm | 4px | Code tag, small chip |
--radius-md | 8px | List item, surface card |
--radius-lg | 14px | Raised panel |
--radius-xl | 20px | Post card (front/back) |
--radius-pill | 999px | Toolbar buttons |
--enlarged-scale when zoomed.
Keep that custom property — it's used at runtime, don't hard-code a second radius value in the enlarged state.
Four-stage card ladder (rest → hover → drag → enlarged) plus list-item and chrome shadows.
Two easings, four durations. Every animation in the system maps to one of these.
| Token | Value | Used by |
|---|---|---|
--ease-standard | cubic-bezier(.2 0 0 1) | Default transitions — toolbar, list, hover |
--ease-iris | cubic-bezier(.4 0 .2 1) | Card expansion, iris overlay |
--dur-fast | 0.2s | Button state, list hover |
--dur-base | 0.4s | Quote fade |
--dur-card | 0.6s | Card layout reflow (left/top/size/radius) |
--dur-flip | 0.8s | Card flip (rotateY 180) |
--dur-iris | 0.8s | Iris expand to 300vmax |
Every interactive surface in the system, with a proposed API. Shape first, implementation second.
interface PostCardProps { post: Post // { id, author, title, quote, url } theme?: Theme // override generator; default themeFor(post.id) state?: 'rest' | 'flipped' | 'enlarged' | 'dragging' onFlip?: (id) => void onNavigate?: (id, origin: DOMRect) => void // origin fuels iris renderFront?: (ctx, theme) => void // pattern render-prop }
interface PillProps { pressed?: boolean // aria-pressed; was .active class onClick?: () => void children: ReactNode } interface ToolbarProps { value: 'shuffle' | 'name' | 'date' | 'list' onChange: (v) => void }
"I stopped measuring my day in hours and started measuring it in uninterrupted blocks."
"The best ideas don't arrive on schedule — they arrive when I stop trying to schedule them."
interface ListItemProps { post: Post theme?: Theme href: string }
interface SurfaceDecoratedProps { variant?: 'mesh' | 'mesh-still' | 'paper' | 'none' intensity?: number // 0..1, opacity multiplier children: ReactNode } /* Slots: - 4 blob layers, mix-blend:multiply, 25s float @keyframes - Paper grain = 2 repeating-linear-gradients at 0° / 90° - Guides (.vertical-guide at 10%/90%) are a separate primitive */
function irisNavigate(url, origin: {x,y}, color: string) { // 1. stash color + origin in sessionStorage for destination // 2. set iris ::before background + transform-origin // 3. add .expanding → width/height → 300vmax // 4. setTimeout(() => location = url, 800) // 5. on pageshow / visibilitychange: reset overlay (bfcache) }
interface HeroProps { kicker?: ReactNode // eyebrow / logo slot title: ReactNode // Plex Serif 700, clamp(3rem, 6vw, 5.5rem) subtitle?: ReactNode // Plex Mono, muted separator?: boolean // default true; 1px rule below logo }
The original kit mixed kebab-case CSS classes with camelCase JS ids. Here is the unified map.
| Before | After | Rationale | |
|---|---|---|---|
| --canvas-bg | → | --color-canvas | Prefix with category, not suffix. Matches Radix. |
| --text-primary | → | --color-ink | "text-*" is reserved for type scale. |
| --text-secondary | → | --color-ink-muted | Same. |
| --text-muted | → | --color-ink-subtle | muted > subtle to give room. |
| --guide-line | → | --color-rule | "rule" is the typographic term. |
| --diagonal-pattern | → | --pattern-diagonal | Group patterns together. |
| .top-toolbar | → | .toolbar | Position is not the component's name. |
| .simple-totalpackage | → | .page | Self-explanatory > WordPress leftover. |
| .card-face.card-front / .card-back | → | .card__face--front / --back | BEM, no double class chaining. |
| .read-prediction-link | → | .card__cta | Generic, reusable. |
| .list-item-author / -headline / -quote | → | .list-item__author / __headline / __quote | BEM element separator. |
| .iris-overlay.active / .expanding | → | data-iris="idle | open | expanding" | State via data-attr is easier to read in devtools. |
| Before | After | Rationale | |
|---|---|---|---|
| #shuffleAll #sortByName #sortByDate #viewToggle | → | Toolbar value=<action> | No global ids. Component-owned. |
| #listViewContainer | → | <PostList /> | Container ids are a React anti-pattern. |
| #irisOverlay | → | portal <IrisTransition /> | Mount once, via React portal. |
| data-design | → | data-pattern | "design" is too broad. |
| data-name / data-headline | → | lift to component props | Dataset was a JS-to-JS smuggling channel. |
| window.PREDICTIONS_DATA / PREDICTIONS_QUOTES | → | usePosts() · async loader | Globals were WordPress-coupled. |
| hasPredixCardsRun | → | n/a (component lifecycle) | Re-run guard belongs to the component. |
| THEMES / COLOR_PALETTES / CUSTOM_COLORS (module-globals) | → | buildPalette(key) · themeFor(id) | Pure functions, no hidden state. |
| CARDS_PER_PILE (closure-let) | → | usePileSize() hook | Derive from viewport, not mutate. |
| currentView string | → | discriminated union | { mode: 'piles' } | { mode: 'sorted', by, dir } | { mode: 'list' } |
Where this system departs from modern DS conventions — on purpose and not on purpose.
gray-1..12, blue-1..12, with step 9 as the "solid". Our generator produces 12 steps too — but we bake them into CSS as a single computed bg per card, not as 12 addressable tokens. fix
--palette-blue-1 … -12 at build time so non-card surfaces (buttons, tags) can reach into the ramp.
shadow-sm, -md, -lg, -xl) mapped to generic use. Our --elevation-1..4 are state tokens (rest / hover / drag / enlarged) — not sizes. intentional
--shadow-sm → --elevation-1 for anything outside the card so we don't re-export the shadow stack twice.
data-state="open|closed|checked". Ours is class-based: .flipped .dragging .enlarged .expanding. fix
data-card-state. Styles become [data-card-state="flipped"] — readable in devtools, composable with Radix primitives later.
position: absolute appended to <body>. Pile Y is computed in JS. Radix/shadcn assume flow layout. intentional
.pile-stage with position: relative. Embeds won't clobber host pages.
.dark token overrides. We have none — the whole kit is light-mode only. fix
mix-blend-mode: screen on dark.
.active, not aria-pressed. Card flip has no keyboard handler. Iris overlay blocks nothing but isn't aria-hidden. fix
role="tablist", pills = role="tab" with aria-selected. Card = button with aria-expanded. Honour prefers-reduced-motion — collapse flip to cross-fade, iris to instant.
text-wrap: balance pervasively. Radix leaves this to consumers. Keep the default — it's cheap and carries the editorial feel. ok