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I agree. Ask clients why they really want Bootstrap and it comes down border-radius on buttons and that blue background color. It's definitely not a better way

I agree. Ask clients why they really want Bootstrap and it comes down border-radius on buttons and that blue background color. It's definitely not a better way to create fluid-responsive viewports. And the whole grid obsession has gone too far. Among graphic designers and studio artists, a "grid" was always just a fun-to-try curiosity for noob artists to learn composition. Grids are only seriously used by "op" (optical illusion) artists and a few OCD artists with an unhealthy obsession with geometric alignment, like maybe Edward Hopper.

detaro 11y ago
Do clients really ask for Bootstrap specifically?
- scarecrowbob 11y ago
  I build WP themes for agencies. They often specify bootstrap or foundation as a starting point. This makes more sense in a context where they are dealing with a lot of freelancers and don't want to deal with 25 idiosyncratic ways to implement a dropdown menu.
  - lumpypua 11y ago
    I specify bootstrap or whatever as a starting point because it's important to me to have a "toolbox" of stuff to pull from. Even after the themer's work is done, I need a set of UI elements to design with as my project's design evolves. A really good example of HTML/CSS toolboxes are a bunch of the themes at wrapbootstrap.com. Here's an example one I like: http://simpleqode.com/preview/paperclip/1.3.2/ui-elements.html http://simpleqode.com/preview/paperclip/1.3.2/ui-elements.ht... For a programmer I have a pretty good graphic design sense, so I can limp along and build my own components while keeping an overall consistent style. A lot of other programmers are awful at this and I've seen some hideous stuff. Rando freelances are the extreme case, but even if you're stuck having a programmer without UI horse sense do UI work, having a framework based UI toolkit is a huge help.
rangibaby 11y ago
> Among graphic designers and studio artists, a "grid" was always just a fun-to-try curiosity for noob artists to learn composition. Some very famous graphic designers used a grid as the basis of their designs. http://www.amazon.com/Grid-Systems-Graphic-Design-Communication/dp/3721201450 http://www.amazon.com/Grid-Systems-Graphic-Design-Communicat...
- pjbrunet 11y ago
  If you're going to use a grid, it's typically a starting point, when you're looking at a blank canvas, blank screen, blank piece of paper. And as your work takes shape, you no longer need the grid. The finished work may still have some pleasing hints of underlying structure, even though the grid has been taken away. You may want to shift things just above or just below alignment to create a little interesting tension, which you can see in Cezanne's work. But usually the grid is completely gone by the time you're done. Most of the time, it's not there to "rule" the composition from start to finish. The grid is typically a reference point. Anyway, my real complaint about grids is all the technical debt it adds, and in the case of Bootstrap it's bad, in my opinion. And it's totally unnecessary. If you want two columns, just work from 50%, you don't need a complex system for that. It's harder to make changes when there's a cryptic grid system in place. When I see code like class="grid-12c" next to class="grid-9b" I'm thinking what the hell? Is that supposed to be human-readable? To me, it seems like a bad trend. If people want grids so bad, then why did we stop using tables 15 years ago? Seriously. I thought floated divs were a step in the right direction, more akin to how designers/artists work, like I can just imagine Matisse saying, "Float that margin a little lower. Perfect!"
  - rangibaby 11y ago
    > If you want two columns, just work from 50%, you don't need a complex system for that. That's what you'd think, but intuitive CSS working differently, or not at all, depending on your browser is what made Bootstrap necessary in the first place. Bootstrap's great feature is that it works at all. I assure you that rolling your own site with a level of functionality provided by Bootstrap is a massive pain in the ass. Tables were a pain in their own way. Don't you remember "font" tags?
michaelbuddy 11y ago
Your ideas that grids and therefore alignment is some quirk among a few OCD artists is quite wrong. Good designers break grid all the time, but they all use grids and guides to some extent. Not using a grid is the sure sign of an amateur. Just because a grid is a well-known concept to everyone doesn't make it amateurish.
- pjbrunet 11y ago
  I have a BFA in this subject and 30+ years of experience designing graphics and interfaces back to Deluxe Paint and Photoshop 1. So I can't take an anon post seriously. What your saying demonstrates my point, it's a self-reinforcing trend that's gaining more traction, and I blame the popularity of Twitter for that. It was not common to see so many CSS grids until Twitter Bootstrap. The problem is, non-designers are buying and selling these frameworks and themes. Often designers aren't even part of the purchase process. And how many designers would object: "You're making a mistake because you will regret the technical debt of this." Hey, more billable hours for everybody when it comes time to maintain the grid within the grid from hell, which was FUBAR code from day 1, further obfuscated by some proprietary WYSIWYG. Wow, the screenshot looks great though! How many designers even use the Bootstrap grid properly, assuming it was a good idea in the first place? The fundamentals of composition haven't changed in hundreds of years. This is false: "Not using a grid is the sure sign of an amateur." Yes, grids go back to the Renaissance, but it's more often a crutch for a new artist copying a master, or for an OCD personality like Edward Hopper. You can feel the cold, painful rigidity of his work, it's amazing--but if the guy was my personal friend, I'd say he needs to loosen up and take off the training wheels. But hey, that's just my opinion ;-)

detaro 11y ago

Do clients really ask for Bootstrap specifically?

scarecrowbob 11y ago
I build WP themes for agencies. They often specify bootstrap or foundation as a starting point. This makes more sense in a context where they are dealing with a lot of freelancers and don't want to deal with 25 idiosyncratic ways to implement a dropdown menu.
- lumpypua 11y ago
  I specify bootstrap or whatever as a starting point because it's important to me to have a "toolbox" of stuff to pull from. Even after the themer's work is done, I need a set of UI elements to design with as my project's design evolves. A really good example of HTML/CSS toolboxes are a bunch of the themes at wrapbootstrap.com. Here's an example one I like: http://simpleqode.com/preview/paperclip/1.3.2/ui-elements.html http://simpleqode.com/preview/paperclip/1.3.2/ui-elements.ht... For a programmer I have a pretty good graphic design sense, so I can limp along and build my own components while keeping an overall consistent style. A lot of other programmers are awful at this and I've seen some hideous stuff. Rando freelances are the extreme case, but even if you're stuck having a programmer without UI horse sense do UI work, having a framework based UI toolkit is a huge help.

rangibaby 11y ago

> Among graphic designers and studio artists, a "grid" was always just a fun-to-try curiosity for noob artists to learn composition. Some very famous graphic designers used a grid as the basis of their designs. http://www.amazon.com/Grid-Systems-Graphic-Design-Communication/dp/3721201450 http://www.amazon.com/Grid-Systems-Graphic-Design-Communicat...

pjbrunet 11y ago
If you're going to use a grid, it's typically a starting point, when you're looking at a blank canvas, blank screen, blank piece of paper. And as your work takes shape, you no longer need the grid. The finished work may still have some pleasing hints of underlying structure, even though the grid has been taken away. You may want to shift things just above or just below alignment to create a little interesting tension, which you can see in Cezanne's work. But usually the grid is completely gone by the time you're done. Most of the time, it's not there to "rule" the composition from start to finish. The grid is typically a reference point. Anyway, my real complaint about grids is all the technical debt it adds, and in the case of Bootstrap it's bad, in my opinion. And it's totally unnecessary. If you want two columns, just work from 50%, you don't need a complex system for that. It's harder to make changes when there's a cryptic grid system in place. When I see code like class="grid-12c" next to class="grid-9b" I'm thinking what the hell? Is that supposed to be human-readable? To me, it seems like a bad trend. If people want grids so bad, then why did we stop using tables 15 years ago? Seriously. I thought floated divs were a step in the right direction, more akin to how designers/artists work, like I can just imagine Matisse saying, "Float that margin a little lower. Perfect!"
- rangibaby 11y ago
  > If you want two columns, just work from 50%, you don't need a complex system for that. That's what you'd think, but intuitive CSS working differently, or not at all, depending on your browser is what made Bootstrap necessary in the first place. Bootstrap's great feature is that it works at all. I assure you that rolling your own site with a level of functionality provided by Bootstrap is a massive pain in the ass. Tables were a pain in their own way. Don't you remember "font" tags?

michaelbuddy 11y ago

Your ideas that grids and therefore alignment is some quirk among a few OCD artists is quite wrong. Good designers break grid all the time, but they all use grids and guides to some extent. Not using a grid is the sure sign of an amateur. Just because a grid is a well-known concept to everyone doesn't make it amateurish.

pjbrunet 11y ago
I have a BFA in this subject and 30+ years of experience designing graphics and interfaces back to Deluxe Paint and Photoshop 1. So I can't take an anon post seriously. What your saying demonstrates my point, it's a self-reinforcing trend that's gaining more traction, and I blame the popularity of Twitter for that. It was not common to see so many CSS grids until Twitter Bootstrap. The problem is, non-designers are buying and selling these frameworks and themes. Often designers aren't even part of the purchase process. And how many designers would object: "You're making a mistake because you will regret the technical debt of this." Hey, more billable hours for everybody when it comes time to maintain the grid within the grid from hell, which was FUBAR code from day 1, further obfuscated by some proprietary WYSIWYG. Wow, the screenshot looks great though! How many designers even use the Bootstrap grid properly, assuming it was a good idea in the first place? The fundamentals of composition haven't changed in hundreds of years. This is false: "Not using a grid is the sure sign of an amateur." Yes, grids go back to the Renaissance, but it's more often a crutch for a new artist copying a master, or for an OCD personality like Edward Hopper. You can feel the cold, painful rigidity of his work, it's amazing--but if the guy was my personal friend, I'd say he needs to loosen up and take off the training wheels. But hey, that's just my opinion ;-)