Guide section 6 of 31
Foundations
| Foundation | Guideline | Preferred control point |
|---|---|---|
| Brand color | Identity/accent only; do not turn every series into brand color. | Design System → Token → Figma → Theme where supported |
| Semantic color | Positive/warning/negative/neutral meanings remain stable across reports. | Design System → semantic token → Figma → Theme/visual configuration |
| Data-series color | Differentiate series; reserve highlight/semantic colors for meaning. | Token → Theme/dataColors → visual configuration |
| Typography | Use a small set of roles: page title, section title, visual title, KPI, body/helper, axis/label. | Design System → Figma → Theme where supported; manual where needed |
| Spacing | Use consistent page margins, section gaps and visual padding. | Token → Figma → template/layout; Power BI positioning/manual configuration |
| Grid | Use a reusable alignment grid; the recovered guide used a 12-column page anatomy as a design-system heuristic. | Figma/template; manual placement in Power BI |
| Alignment | Align visual edges and baselines; group by whitespace before adding containers. | Figma/template → Power BI placement |
| Borders | Use sparingly to clarify grouping; avoid boxing every visual. | Token → Theme/visual configuration where supported |
| Backgrounds | Use page/surface contrast to establish hierarchy, not decoration. | Token → Theme/page/visual background |
| Elevation | Use only when supported and semantically useful; do not import web-card depth conventions automatically. | Design System → Figma; Power BI visual effects where supported |
| States | Selected, filtered, disabled/irrelevant, empty/no data, loading and error expectations should be documented. | Figma/annotation → native behavior or explicit workaround |
| Iconography | Use semantic icons with text where meaning matters; avoid icon-only ambiguity. | Design System → Figma → image/button/native formatting as applicable |
| Density | Operational pages can be denser than executive pages; every region must have a role. | Template/page composition |
| Number formatting | Define decimals, separators, units, currency, %, pp and abbreviations consistently. | Model/measure/DAX + visual formatting |
| Date formatting | Use business-relevant granularity and consistent period labels. | Model/field formatting + visual configuration |
Design-system heuristic A useful default for an overview is roughly 3–5 summary indicators, one dominant analytical visual, 1–3 explanatory visuals and optionally one detail visual. This is not a Power BI limit. The actual rule is to include only what is needed to answer the page question.