Motion
Motion in Palette means the model is working. Everything else is still, or moves once in response to a touch. One beat keeps every moving part in step, and one switch stops them all.
One tempo
| Token | Value | Use |
|---|---|---|
--beat | 2400ms | Signal motion: the model thinking, writing, or waiting for review. Holds that seal an action last half a beat. |
--signal | 280ms | Interface responses: sheets, buttons, page transitions. Once, then still. |
--ease-flow | Movement that starts and settles: sheets, scenes. | |
--ease-out | Responses to touch: they start fast and land softly. | |
--ease-spring | Things that appear: murmurs, the ring keyboard. A small overshoot, never a bounce. |
What may move
| State | Motion | Components |
|---|---|---|
| The model is thinking | The model caret blinks; the model mark turns | Caret, Tide |
| The model is writing | Words arrive behind a steady model caret | Flux, Murmur |
| Model work awaits review | Pigment flows once per beat | Flux, Rail |
| The model changed something | One pulse where it landed, then still | Shift |
| A person touches something | One response of 280 ms | Morph, sheets |
| Settled content | None | Everything |
Budget
Motion costs battery and attention. On an earlier Palette board with every component moving at once, the browser’s main thread stayed about 22% busy. With Still on it fell to about 1.5%, and moving off-screen animations to sleep took them to zero.
- Keep three components or fewer in signal motion per screen.
- Draw on the shared clock. A component that returns false rests until something wakes it.
- Sleep anything off screen: canvases stop drawing and CSS animations pause, including on pseudo-elements.
- Prefer motion that ends. A summary that plays once and rests (Reel) costs a few seconds; a looping one costs the whole visit.
Moving between pages
Pages slide in the direction you travel: forward pushes from the right, back returns from the left, in one signal. The top bar and dock stay put, and a page’s pictogram carries across into its title. With Still on, pages change in place.
Still
Still stops all motion: the top bar’s pause button and Settings both switch it, and it turns on by itself when a device asks for reduced motion. Still is not a degraded mode. Every state must stay readable through colour, shape and words.