Helps with grouping, alignment, reading order, progressive disclosure and other details that make a good layout.

Layout This skill sets grouping, alignment, spacing and responsive structure. It then stress tests that structure by resizing it, translating it and mirroring it for RTL. Write every fix in the project's styling system. The numbers below apply only where the project has no spacing scale or density system; otherwise use its tokens. A finding needs a failure you can show, such as a clip, an overlap, a broken mirror or a misread group. A value that differs from these starting points is not one. Hit areas and focus behavior belong to better accessibility . Radius, shadows and animation belong to better ui . Line length, text spacing and truncation mechanics belong to better typography . The words themselves belong to better writing . Group with space, not lines Space groups first, background shapes second, separator lines last and only where space alone can't carry the structure. The gap between groups is at least 2× the gap within one, so 8px inside a group means 16px or more between groups. Recipes are in [grouping and alignment.md](grouping and alignment.md group with space not lines). Keep controls distinct from content Give every interactive element a background shape, a border, an underline or a consistent placement zone such as a toolbar. A control styled like the static text beside it does not read as a control. See [grouping and alignment.md](grouping and alignment.md keep controls distinct from content). Align to shared edges Pick a small set of alignment edges and put everything on them. Use one project spacing step per level of nesting, where 16px is a useful default. See [grouping and alignment.md](grouping and alignment.md align to shared edges). Logical properties for anything that mirrors Write direction dependent layout as leading and trailing: margin inline start , padding inline end , inset inline start , text align: start . Reserve physical left and right for physical geometry such as safe area insets. The mapping table and the RTL progression rules are in [grouping and alignment.md](grouping and alignment.md logical properties for anything that mirrors). Order by importance The most important content sits near the top and the leading edge. Within a row, identifying content leads and metadata and actions trail. Visual order matches DOM order, so never move content out of source sequence with order , row reverse or grid placement. See [grouping and alignment.md](grouping and alignment.md order by importance). One primary action per view Give each view one primary action. Put secondary actions behind a menu once there are more than 3. Prefer a short view that links deeper over one long view that shows everything at the top level. better colors owns how color marks the primary action. Hint at hidden content Every piece of off screen or collapsed content needs a visible cue. Use the project's established cue, let the next item peek 16–32px past the scroll edge or show a disclosure control. A truncated value the user needs has a way to the full text: an expand control, a detail view or a tooltip that is also keyboard reachable. Truncation mechanics are better typography 's. Recipes are in [spacing and adaptivity.md](spacing and adaptivity.md hint at hidden content). Borderless controls need more clearance Without an established density system, start with 12px between adjacent bordered or filled controls. Leave 24px between the visible glyphs of borderless text and icon controls, counting each button's own padding. Compact layouts may use less, as long as hit areas never overlap and the controls stay distinct. See [spacing and adaptivity.md](spacing and adaptivity.md borderless controls need more clearance). Inset buttons from the edges In content layouts, keep full width buttons inside the layout margins, starting near 16px inline on mobile. Edge to edge actions work when they follow established platform chrome, account for safe areas and stay distinguishable from system UI. See [spacing and adaptivity.md](spacing and adaptivity.md inset buttons from the edges). Content bleeds, controls float Backgrounds and media extend to the viewport edges. Controls and text stay inside the layout margins and safe areas. env(safe area inset ) is non zero only when the viewport meta includes viewport fit=cover . Content scrolls beneath sticky chrome. Set scroll padding block start to the sticky header's height, so anchored targets and focused elements never land under it. See [spacing and adaptivity.md](spacing and adaptivity.md content bleeds controls float). Hold structure until it breaks Breakpoints come from the content, not device presets. Keep the expanded layout until it stops fitting, then collapse. Prefer container queries for component level adaptation, and test the smallest and largest supported sizes first. See [spacing and adaptivity.md](spacing and adaptivity.md hold structure until it breaks). Plan for growth and clipping Translated strings grow, and short ones grow proportionally more, so a one word button label is the riskiest thing on the screen. Size text containers with max width and min height , never a fixed width or height, and let rows wrap. Test with pseudo localization and one long string locale such as German. Never park a critical action where resizing, zoom or scrolling clips it. Keep it in the normal flow or in stable chrome. See [spacing and adaptivity.md](spacing and adaptivity.md plan for growth and clipping). Before you finish Detection pattern Fix grid template columns: … 1fr or a flex child holding long text or a wide table, overflowing its track minmax(0, 1fr) on the track, min width: 0 on the flex child width: 100vw width: 100% ; 100vw includes the scrollbar and scrolls horizontally on desktop height: 100vh on a full height mobile pane 100dvh , so the browser toolbar and keyboard never cover the bottom height: with a fixed length on a box holding text min height , or max height with overflow y: auto @media (max width: …) inside a reusable component @container on the component's parent container type: inline size on a flex item, inline block or absolute element with no width Give it a definite width; size containment collapses a shrink to fit box to zero env(safe area inset ) with no viewport fit=cover in the viewport meta Add it, or the insets resolve to 0 inset inline or inline combined with safe area inset left or right Physical left or right with the matching inset, plus a [dir="rtl"] override float: left on mirrored UI float: inline start translateX or background position: left on mirrored UI A [dir="rtl"] override; neither has a logical form Sticky header with no scroll padding block start Set it to the header height Reporting Severity. HIGH blocks content or an action at a supported viewport. Clipping or overlap at 320px width or 200% zoom is always HIGH , as is truncated content with no way to the full value. So is content past a scroll edge or behind a disclosure with no visible cue. MEDIUM harms hierarchy, reading order or adaptability. LOW is isolated alignment or spacing polish. Verification. Without a browser, check logical properties in place of physical ones, container and media queries against the supported viewport list and DOM order against visual order. With one, check every supported width, 320px, 200% zoom and the RTL mirror. Report every check you could not run as Not verified . Format. Group findings under the principle each violates, ordered by severity, one row per root cause listing every location it appears in: Severity Location Before After Why Location is path/to/file:line . Why names the principle and the user impact. End with Block when any HIGH remains, Approve otherwise, leaving the rest in the table as work to do. Never Approve coverage you did not inspect. With nothing to report, state "No actionable layout findings" and report verification.

better-layout