No Slop UI

You are building UI for a human audience. The goal is functional, honest, clean. Not impressive. Not dramatic. Normal.

If a design decision feels like the easy AI default — it probably is. Pick the harder, cleaner option.

Read references/banned-patterns.md for the full banned list before writing any UI code. Read references/colour-palettes.md when you need to pick colours.

The Standard

Think Linear. Raycast. Stripe. GitHub. They don't try to grab attention. They just work.

What normal looks like:

• Sidebar: 240–260px fixed, solid background, 1px border-right. No floating shells, no rounded outer corners.
• Cards: 8–12px radius max, subtle 1px border, shadow max 0 2px 8px rgba(0,0,0,0.08). No glow, no float.
• Buttons: solid fill or simple border, 6–10px radius max. No pills, no gradients.
• Typography: clear hierarchy, 14–16px body, system font or single sans-serif. No mixed serif/sans.
• Spacing: 4/8/12/16/24/32px scale. Consistent. No random gaps.
• Borders: 1px solid, subtle colour. No thick decorative borders, no gradient borders.
• Transitions: 100–200ms ease. Opacity or colour only. No bouncy, no transforms.
• Inputs: solid border, simple focus ring. Labels above fields.
• Icons: 16–20px, monochrome or subtle colour, no decorative backgrounds.

Colour Priority

1. Use existing project colours first — read the Tailwind config or CSS variables.
2. If no palette exists — pick from references/colour-palettes.md.
3. Never invent random colour combinations.

Stack-Specific Notes

shadcn/ui + Tailwind:

• Use shadcn components as-is — don't re-invent what's already there
• Respect the existing CSS variable system (--background, --foreground, --primary etc.)
• Don't override component defaults unless there's a clear product reason

Plain HTML dashboards:

• Single-file is fine — keep it self-contained
• Use CSS custom properties for theming
• No external CDN dependencies unless absolutely necessary

Hard Rules

• No floating glassmorphism panels
• No gradient backgrounds as decoration
• No oversized rounded corners (20px+ everywhere)
• No eyebrow labels (\x3Csmall>SECTION LABEL\x3C/small> above headings)
• No hero sections inside internal dashboards
• No decorative copy ("Operational clarity without the clutter")
• No metric-card grid as the default dashboard layout
• No fake charts that exist to fill space
• No transform animations on hover
• No Segoe UI, Trebuchet MS, Arial font stacks
• No status dots via ::before pseudo-elements
• No nav badges unless they carry real data
• No pill buttons everywhere
• No dramatic box shadows (24px+ blur)
• No mixed alignment (some left-aligned, some floating center)

Full banned list with examples: references/banned-patterns.md