feat(Toolbar & Tabs): support more density scale levels in Toolbar or Tabs
- Dominant language
- TypeScript
- Stars
- 25k
- Forks
- 6.8k
- Avg merge
- 1d 8h
- Merged PRs (30d)
- 91
Description
### Feature Description
Currently there are these densities supported for Tabs:
https://github.com/angular/components/blob/a7f87a80a18a62d75a8c5621fd89dbc2cf28a865/src/material/core/tokens/m2/mdc/_tab.scss#L69

and these for Toolbar:
https://github.com/angular/components/blob/a7f87a80a18a62d75a8c5621fd89dbc2cf28a865/src/material/core/tokens/m2/mat/_toolbar.scss#L38

From these `scale levels vs height in pixels` maps we can see that the highest Tabs have their Tab Header 48px high and the lowest Toolbar is 52px high (on desktop). This means these two components never get the same height regardless the density applied.
In case they are used next to each other, when Tabs are used as kind of a 'toolbar' on a screen, it causes a visual discrepancy. Here is a demonstration where default 0 density is used for Tabs and -3 density used for Toolbars:
https://stackblitz.com/edit/egbtbh?file=src%2Ftheme.scss

This may look as a tiny problem, but the Design, Business or QA departments may have very attentive eyes and report this as a visual bug (as it happened in my team). I am trying to avoid changing the heights with some custom CSS as this is not an approach recommended by Angular Material team as per this section in the official docs: https://material.angular.io/guide/customizing-component-styles#targeting-custom-styles

Therefore my question is, would it be please possible to add more density scale levels for either Tabs or Toolbar and still be compliant to the Material Design specs? Or maybe the whole use case of having Tabs next to a Toolbar is not correct from the Material Design specs point of view and I should ask our Design department to fix the designs?
### Use Case
_No response_
Contributor guide
Research direction
Start by comparing the density definitions in src/material/core/tokens/m2/mdc/_tab.scss and src/material/core/tokens/m2/mat/_toolbar.scss. Reproduce the mismatch in the linked StackBlitz example and review the Material Design guidance linked in the issue. Done means determining whether additional density levels are appropriate and documenting or implementing an aligned result.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- angular, typescript
- Domain
- design, frontend
- Issue type
- Feature
- Difficulty
- 5/5
- Estimated time
- Over a week
- Activity status
- Stale
- Clarity
- Needs clarification
- Newbie friendliness
- 25/100