🎨 Introduction: Bridging Design and Code
Frontend development often involves the same data living in multiple places —
CSS files for styling, and TypeScript files for logic and configuration.
This notebook introduces a CSS to TypeScript Converter, a small but powerful utility that transforms CSS-defined values (such as colors) into a structured TypeScript format that can be reused across modern frontend codebases.
This is about eliminating duplication.
🎯 Purpose: One Source of Truth
The goal of this notebook is to demonstrate how to:
- Parse CSS files programmatically
- Extract reusable values (e.g. colors)
- Convert them into TypeScript-friendly objects
- Create a single source of truth for design tokens
This is especially useful in projects using frameworks like React, Next.js, or Tailwind-based systems.
🧠 How It Works: From Stylesheet to Script
At a high level, the converter follows this workflow:
- Read a CSS file containing color definitions
- Parse and extract relevant values
- Transform the data into a structured format
- Output a TypeScript file exporting usable constants
This turns static styles into developer-friendly data.
🧩 The Technical Part: Parsing and Transformation
A simplified version of the idea looks like this:
colors = {
"blue": "#2B7FFF",
"orange": "#FF6900"
}
Which then becomes a TypeScript-friendly output:
export const colors = {
blue: "#2B7FFF",
orange: "#FF6900",
};
🔍 What’s Being Demonstrated
- 🧩 Reading and processing external files
- 🔄 Transforming data between formats
- 🧱 Generating code programmatically
- 🎯 Aligning backend tooling with frontend needs
This pattern is commonly used in build tools and design systems.
💡 Key Takeaways: Automating Frontend Workflows
This notebook highlights several valuable ideas:
- 🎨 Design tokens should be reusable
- 🔁 Automation reduces manual errors
- 🧱 Python is great for one-off dev tools
- 🧠 Small scripts can save hours long-term
It’s a strong example of developer experience (DX) thinking.
🏁 Conclusion: Small Tool, Big Impact
The CSS to TypeScript Converter shows how a simple notebook can solve a real frontend pain point:
Don’t copy values — generate them.
By automating the bridge between CSS and TypeScript, this approach encourages cleaner, more maintainable frontend architectures and opens the door to more advanced tooling.
🔗 Link to Notebook
Notebook link: Coming Soon