I noticed that almost everyone’s tribute page has bootstrap included, which is very odd to me. I’m building my tribute page from scratch using Vanilla (Basic) HTML and CSS. Is that normal? I understand the benefits of using Bootstrap, and Frameworks in general, but I don’t know how to use them that much.
Besides that, I strongly believe that building a website from scratch using Basic HTML and CSS without any frameworks (Bootstrap) is more beneficial to the beginner coder, even though it takes longer.
I still consider myself to be a beginner, but when I first started out I learned basic HTML and CSS and then learned Bootstrap. I liked Bootstrap because it allowed me to create some cool looking pages right away without being an expert in HTML or CSS. So in that sense, it was great as a beginner to be making functional websites that I knew would work across different browsers. I felt like I was accomplishing a lot in a relatively small amount of time.
Of course, the other side is that I eventually ended up in a place where I realized I actually knew very little about CSS and even less about responsive design. This led me to start digging into how Bootstrap accomplished certain tasks, which led me to learning a great deal about CSS. Since then, I have gone on to learn a great deal about CSS in general, and I no longer use Bootstrap in my FCC projects, just because I want the experience of developing without it.
Overall one could probably present good reasons to start with Bootstrap, and good reasons to ignore Bootstrap until you’re more comfortable with HTML/CSS.
I tried bootstrap for my tribute page only and then switched to standard for all my other projects becasue I could see all that I was learning was bootstrap classes. I’m so glad I did. That said Bootstrap does have a place at FCC I suppose.
I can see the attraction to bootstrap because it removes alot of the problems us beginners face… but we need to face those problems sooner or later anyway so i’d just dive right into flexbox. Not everyone wants to load up their plate so much though. As @jv88899 said, I think (hope) people come to the realisation they know squat about css layout and making their own gadgets such as menu’s or forms or even sliders and then take the time to learn it without bootstrap.
I will say though, as FCC is not intended to focus on html/css, bootstrap is a great introduction to what a responsive website should look like and allows those less inclined or brand new to webdev to produce something they like.
That’s very interesting. I wonderwhat took FCC this long to realise how essential vanilla HTML & CSS is for beginners. I think bootstrap should be something that is taught at a later stage in from end development, maybe once the coder gets to an intermediate level with both languages.
There’re various screen sizes, it’s the mobile first era, studying web design without regard to responsive principles is futile. And Bootstrap does many of the heavy lifting for you. Although it has many advanced features, it is possible to make use of basic Bootstrap. Creating your own responsive design is an advanced concept which is too early at that stage in the curriculum.
However, mentioning jquery before javascript… that I don’t get in the curriculum.
Thanks for clarifying it up. Unlucky for me, I am not that good at bootstrap. At the moment I don’t mind developing websites without it, however in the future I would like to use Bootstrap as framework in my code.
I should have paid more attention to those FCC Bootstrap lessons, and in High-school in general. Oh well, back to coding!
I understand what you mean by hype, anywhere you read on the internet someone has an opinion about it and elitists (I might be an evangelist but i’m certainly not an elitist) might drone on about it and all the other language discusions in the same vein too. Theres something to be said for knowing the basics though so you can understand the mechanics behind something. It’s good for trouble shooting, and something thats ingraned in me from my previous career.
Is “vanilla” important for early FCC? No. I dont think so. Can you call yourself a front end developer before learning vanilla. No, I don’t think so either. I havn’t done anything real world yet though so I suppose you could say what do i know?
Incidently, I think I might be leaning on jQuery a bit too much after seeing other peoples project code on here.
From my experience with FCC, you get to learn vanilla javascript in the later course, specifically in React projects.
I would say that learning how to use CSS framework is not essential, but it does help a lot of things in terms of making web responsive so you can focus on the actual app.
On the other hand, it helps to know HOW it works too. In my second revision of my portfolio page, I made without bootstrap and used plain html css and ja and still made it responsive via media queries and flex-box CSS. I learned a lot, but then found myself using bootstrap again in my third revision of my portfolio, simply because now I understood the power of css framework.
As for jQuery, I find myself less using it after learning React (in terms of DOM Manipulation). I would say learning jQuery first helps beginners about DOM Manipulation.
Don’t worry about it, I think everyones enjoying the discussion here
Thats what I was getting at with elitist. Quora can be shockingly elitist about this and other “arguments”[quote=“Neotriz, post:12, topic:46246”]
As for jQuery, I find myself less using it after learning React (in terms of DOM Manipulation). I would say learning jQuery first helps beginners about DOM Manipulation.
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That’s good to know, and y’know I wouldn’t mind, but the plane js is just a few charachters longer than a jQuery html insert but my brain still defaults to jQuery.
No, seriously I only advocate flexbox so much because I know it accelerated my understanding of responsive design. I also think it’s super easy but last time I said that most people disagreed.
As for JS. yeh i only scratched the surface and I find the algorithms tough going most of the time. I do feel like I have to know what’s going on “under the hood” before I get to things like react and angular, but then I’m kind of enrolled to that mindset by default
I think your probably right there. As a wannabe freelancer I would expect that to be the case for most clients in my area of the UK, depends what exactly I ended up doing though. If I ended up doing something more data oriented I would expect the clients then to be a lot more technically savvy.
The guys who make battling Pikachus with pure CSS on CodePen are not using Bootstrap, I can tell you that. Those CSS wizards don’t use bootstrap because it’s too limiting.
I find bootstrap to be limiting too. It’s great for getting something off the ground in a hurry, but if you have any kind of time at all then I recommend writing your own CSS. Not every project uses Bootstrap. Most modern websites don’t use it.
Learn to flexbox your own navbars. Learn what a float does and how to clear a float. Learn how media queries work to assign different CSS to different screen sizes. Learn CSS thoroughly from a textbook.
I agree. Coding using your own CSS language encourages more creativity, although it might take longer. There are pros and cons for each, but once you learn flexbox, the things you can do with CSS are insane!
I totally agree. There will be blood.