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> In fact, I think it’s confusing to call them variables at all. They’re actually CSS properties, which gives them an entirely different set of capabilities an
by yxhuvud 11y ago
> In fact, I think it’s confusing to call them variables at all. They’re actually CSS properties, which gives them an entirely different set of capabilities and allows them to solve an entirely different set of problems.
I think this is the problem people have with them - they don't try to be a good solution to the problem people actually have. A better designed solution would have the most common case simple and elegant, and more esoteric use-cases, like the ones they are trying to solve, may have esoteric solutions like the proposed one.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- chrismorgan 11y agoCSS Variables have been in Firefox for a year and a half now, and I’ve been using them in my own projects for at least a year, while I’m producing the thing in the first place—then when I have it as I like it, if it’s not purely for me, I rewrite it for inferior browsers (though I believe I could use something like PostCSS instead; I just haven’t). They really are a marvellous thing; my favourite example would be the construction of truly responsive interfaces, tweaked for optimality at many levels and continuous, rather than just things with three or four breakpoints; with preprocessors, it’s tedious and painful; with CSS variables it’s easy and obvious—it pushes you in a direction that is so much easier to make. In essence, they are solving a substantially different set of problems, but one that is more useful and more general; the sorts of things people did with preprocessor variables can normally be done in better ways with CSS Variables; it helps guide you to a better position.
- toufka 11y agoHow?
- err4nt 11y ago> They really are a marvellous thing; my favourite example would be the construction of truly responsive interfaces, tweaked for optimality at many levels and continuous, rather than just things with three or four breakpoints; with preprocessors, it’s tedious and painful; Anything with preprocessors is tedious and painful, yet I've been hand-writing fluidly responsive layouts for years without predefined 'breakpoint' jumps in the design. What is it about CSS variables that allowed you to change your style?
- jay_kyburz 11y agoBy using percentage values?
- err4nt 11y agoAre you asking me if I use percentage values to do fluidly responsive designs? There's definitely some of that but most of the time it's even simpler than that - just defining a max width or height on something and letting things expand to fill their containers. Then you only have a few big containers in the entire layout to worry about :)