Medium · Workflow
Tokens for agents
Make the design system machine-readable before you let an agent touch production UI.
Purpose
DESIGN.md / UX-context design, Carbon for AI, and DTCG tokens exist so agents inherit constraints instead of inventing chrome. Medium track: you do not “prompt harder” — you publish tokens and rules the agent can read. Without this, profi MCP handoff amplifies mess.
Steps
1. **Inventory** — color, type, space, motion, component inventory; mark gaps.
2. **Publish machine form** — DTCG JSON and/or DESIGN.md / context file the agent stack can load.
3. **Name map** — Figma variables ↔ code tokens; kill aliases that only humans understand.
4. **Smoke prompt** — ask an agent to restyle one component using only the published file; diff violations.
5. **Gate** — no Make/MCP production pass until smoke violations are zero or explicitly waived.
When to use / Skip
Use before any agent writes into a branded product UI. Skip for throwaway discovery mocks (`prompt-to-wire-mock`). Falsifier: if the agent’s output introduces unnamed hex or off-system type, the tokens package is not ready — fix the package, not the prompt.