Building a dashboard with Next.js using Appwrite’s Pink Design

Obinna Isiwekpeni - Mar 20 '23 - - Dev Community

Pink Design is an open-source system from Appwrite used to build consistent and reusable user interfaces. It enhances collaboration, development experience, and accessibility. This tutorial demonstrates how to use Appwrite’s Pink Design to create a Dashboard with Next.js.

GitHub

Check out the complete source code here.

Prerequisites

To follow along with this tutorial, you should have a working knowledge of the following:

  • React, Next.js, and CSS
  • An IDE of your choice

Creating a Next.js project

To create a Next.js project, perform the following steps:

  • Open a terminal and run this command line to scaffold a Next.js app: ```powershell

npx create-next-app sample-dashboard

- Go to the project directory and start the development server on `localhost:3000` with this command:
```powershell


cd sample-dashboard && npm run dev


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Getting started with Pink Design

You can integrate Pink Design into a project via a content delivery network (CDN) or Node Package Manager (NPM). In this tutorial, we’ll use NPM.

To install Pink Design, open a terminal in the project directory and run the following command:



npm install @appwrite.io/pink


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The package should be found in your package.json file.

package.json file

To use Pink Design in your project, import it into your project’s JavaScript files.

Creating the dashboard

For the purpose of this tutorial, you will create a simple dashboard that shows some dummy contract data using Pink Design.

  • Create a src/components folder at the root of your project. In the folder, create a ContractStatus.js component and paste the code below into it.


import "@appwrite.io/pink";
import "@appwrite.io/pink-icons";

const ContractStatus = () => {
    return (
        <div class="u-flex u-main-center">
            <div class="u-margin-32">
                <div class="status is-complete">
                    <span class="status-icon"></span>
                    <span class="text">Accepted</span>
                </div>
                <h4 class="heading-level-4 u-text-center">2,340</h4>
            </div>
            <div class="u-margin-32">
                <div class="status is-pending">
                    <span class="status-icon"></span>
                    <span class="text">In Contract</span>
                </div>
                <h4 class="heading-level-4 u-text-center">1,782</h4>
            </div>
            <div class="u-margin-32">
                <div class="status is-processing">
                    <span class="status-icon"></span>
                    <span class="text">In Approval</span>
                </div>
                <h4 class="heading-level-4 u-text-center">1,596</h4>
            </div>

        </div>
    )
}
export default ContractStatus;


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The code above does the following:

  • Lines 1 and 2 import Appwrite’s Pink Design package and its icons.
  • In the main container, the u-flex class from Pink Design styles the container as flex, and u-main- center justifies the container’s content to the center.
  • status is-complete, is-pending, is-processing specify the status of a process.
  • The status-icon class uses the icon that matches the specified status class.
  • heading-level-4 is a typographic functionality that specifies the heading size.
  • u-margin-32 defines the margin of the container or item.

You can see from the code above how Pink Design makes it easy to style elements.

  • Import the src/components/ContractStatus.js component into the pages/index.js file. The file should look like this at this point:


import Head from 'next/head'
import ContractStatus from '@/src/components/ContractStatus';
import "@appwrite.io/pink";
export default function Home() {
  return (
    <>
      <Head>
        <title>Contract Dashboard</title>
      </Head>
      <div class="box u-margin-32 u-padding-block-12">
        <h1 class="heading-level-1 u-text-center">Contract Dashboard</h1>
        <ContractStatus />
      </div>
    </>
  )
}


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In the code above, the box class styles the container as a box, u-margin-32 applies a margin of 32px, and u-padding-block-12 applies a padding of 0.75rem.

At this point, your UI should look like this:

Dashboard

  • Create a src/components/CycleTime.js component and paste the code below into it. ```javaScript

const CycleTime = () => {
return (


Average Cycle Time






25 days


NDA


class="avatar"
width="32"
height="32"
src="https://unsplash.it/41"
alt="image"
/>






12 days


Insurance


class="avatar"
width="32"
height="32"
src="https://unsplash.it/41"
alt="image"
/>






45 days


Lease


class="avatar"
width="32"
height="32"
src="https://unsplash.it/41"
alt="image"
/>






18 days


Purchase


class="avatar"
width="32"
height="32"
src="https://unsplash.it/41"
alt="image"
/>



    </div>
)

}

export default CycleTime;

The code above creates a series of **alert-grids** for displaying some data. Alerts indicate task-generated and system-generated messages. In this case, it is static, but the purpose is to show how easy Pink Design aids in creating alerts. The type of alert must be set by the user: for example, **is-success,** **is-warning**, and **is-info**.

- Import the `src/components/CycleTime.js` component into the `pages/index.js` file. The file should look like this at this point:
```javaScript


import Head from 'next/head'
import ContractStatus from '@/src/components/ContractStatus';
import CycleTime from '@/src/components/CycleTime';
import "@appwrite.io/pink";

export default function Home() {
  return (
    <>
      <Head>
        <title>Contract Dashboard</title>
      </Head>
      <div class="box u-margin-32 u-padding-block-12">
        <h1 class="heading-level-1 u-text-center">Contract Dashboard</h1>
        <ContractStatus />
        <CycleTime/>
      </div>
    </>
  )
}


At this point, the UI should look like this:

Dashboard

  • Create a src/components/ContractTable.js component and paste the code below into it. ```javaScript

import "@appwrite.io/pink";
import "@appwrite.io/pink-icons";

const ContractTable = () => {
return (


My Contracts










































Serial No.
Name

Value

Status

Deadline


1001


Horizon Tech

$48,292


Active


01.01.2024


1002


Flowtech Labs

$20,500


Draft


-


1003


ServerTech

$15,800


Active


01.03.2024


1004


DoveTech

$20,500


Active


01.01.2024
    </div>
)

}
export default ContractTable;

The code above creates a table using Appwrite’s Pink Design. Tables consist of five components:

| Class               | Type        |
| ------------------- | ----------- |
| **table-thead**     | Head        |
| **table-thead-col** | Head Column |
| **table-tbody**     | Body        |
| **table-row**       | Row         |
| **table-col**       | Column      |

- Import the `src/components/ContractTable.js` into the `pages/index.js` file. The file should look like this:
```javaScript


import Head from 'next/head'
import ContractStatus from '@/src/components/ContractStatus';
import ContractTable from '@/src/components/ContractTable';
import CycleTime from '@/src/components/CycleTime';
import "@appwrite.io/pink";

export default function Home() {
  return (
    <>
      <Head>
        <title>Contract Dashboard</title>
      </Head>
      <div class="box u-margin-32 u-padding-block-12">
        <h1 class="heading-level-1 u-text-center">Contract Dashboard</h1>
        <ContractStatus />
        <CycleTime/>
        <ContractTable/>
      </div>
    </>
  )
}


Finally, the UI should look like this at this point.

Dashboard

Conclusion

This tutorial described how to use Appwrite’s Pink Design to create a Dashboard. It showed the ease of use of Pink Design and its accessibility.

The resources below will be helpful:

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