Picture Perfect Frame - UI Frameworks

21 Feb 2019

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Pictures can speak a thousand words; similarly, frameworks can replace a thousand lines.

Picture Perfect - Pros

Frameworks provide the building blocks that allows the coder to implement various items quickly and easily. By using Semantic UI, we were able to simply implement various modules and components onto our website in an efficient manner. In addition, it increase the legibility of the code, letting coders understand each section. For example, if you wanted to implement a menu with eight items, you can just define the class “ui eight item menu” and it would appear from the HTML file. If you wanted to implement a borderless three column grid, just define the class and you’ll get it! Another benefit of utilizing the framework is the responsive nature it is able to accommodate, being responsive to the sizing of the window. This translates the website to be adaptive depending on sizing, letting the user visualize the website from a desktop, to a tablet, to a mobile device.

Shattered Frame - Cons

Despite the benefits of frameworks, there are also some disadvantages that it provides for software engineers. For starters, it makes the code ambiguous due to the simplified mannerisms of using the framework, hiding the substance of the code to implement the application. Additionally, it takes an investment of time and effort into learning the specific framework, knowing how to create what you wish. It definitely took some practice in order to know what you can define in the class to implement certain specifications in the Semantic UI framework. I found IntelliJ really hopeful during these parts since it drops a list of possible inputs to complete your code!