Donnie Silalahi

What I'm doing now

I'm online

This is a /now page — inspired by Derek Sivers — where I share what I'm currently focusing on in my life.

SUN01 FEB 2026

Experimented with an audio feedback project to explore how sound can enhance user experience. Working on understanding how subtle audio cues can create more intuitive interactions without being distracting. The goal is to create audio feedback that feels natural — like the satisfying click of a mechanical keyboard or the soft notification chime that informs without interrupting flow. Still early days, but excited about where this could lead.

WED28 JAN 2026

Diving deeper into design systems and how they scale across organizations. Fascinated by the balance between consistency and flexibility. Spent the week studying how successful companies maintain design coherence while allowing teams to adapt components to their specific contexts. The key seems to be creating principles-based systems rather than rigid rules. This ties directly into what I'm building at work — we need a system that scales with our product team while maintaining our design DNA.

SUN25 JAN 2026

Finally launched this personal website. It's been a long time coming — years of wanting a space to document my learning journey. Built with TanStack Start, Shadcn UI, and Tailwind CSS. Deployed on Cloudflare Workers. The goal was something fast, simple, and future-proof. The design is heavily influenced by my love for paper and physical objects — lots of texture, subtle shadows, and attention to detail in the small interactions. This is v0.1. Much more to come.