Latest changes to the Canada.ca design system

Carousels are no longer mandatory on theme pages.

We made the following changes:

• we’ve added Writing for inclusivity to the Writing principles for web content section of the Canada.ca Content Style Guide
• we modified the wording for the Access to Information and Privacy requests on the Transparency and corporate reporting template

We made the following changes:

• Mandatory elements: we moved the detailed guidance on mandatory elements to the template and pattern library
• Institutional landing page: we are introducing a new beta template for the institutional landing page, merging the institutional and organizational profiles to better reflect the role and purpose of this mandatory template
• Report a problem: we modified the guidance to allow for some customization
• Transparency template: we are introducing a new suggested layout for transparency and corporate reporting information
• Basic page layout: we created examples that show how patterns can be combined in a basic page layout
• Contextual alerts: we are introducing a new beta pattern for contextual alerts
• Expand/collapse: we modified the guidance to allow the use of expand/collapse to present a choice between mutually exclusive answers

We made the following minor change:

• we changed the Date modified pattern to reflect the format currently in use across Canada.ca: yyyy-mm-dd

We’ve made major updates to the Canada.ca design system:

• the Canada.ca Content and Information Architecture Specification now contains only core requirements:
• who must follow the Canada.ca design system
• what elements are mandatory
• how to organize content
• how to design content
• the mandatory elements specify what departments must do to reflect the trusted digital brand of the Government of Canada
• the template and design pattern library contains all detailed information about specific templates and patterns
• a new interactive pattern selector makes it easier to find the right template or design pattern
• the organizing content section simplifies the direction on information architecture, user-need categories and the URL model
• the topic page template is now only mandatory for the first 2 topic layers, although it can be used at lower levels when appropriate
• the home page design reflects the recent changes to the live site

Overall, this update signals a shift in philosophy. We’ve shortened the list of mandatory elements, and shifted the focus to task success for users. Templates and design patterns will be changed and improved regularly, based on evidence. All changes will be documented on this page.