I used to know how to design well. Until I realized I've been too confined with my own self-discovered processes.
Here are my thoughts and tips on using of CSS Frameworks and tools like Compass, Blueprint CSS, 960 GS and many others:
- To design with confidence means to learn new things without discarding old concepts or even old tools like Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Fireworks.
- Frameworks should help you focus on innovating rather than fixing bugs that is why I think "CSS Frameworks" are aptly called as such because they help you speed up your work and focus on communicating functionality (backend) issues with your client instead.
- If you are a lone developer like myself, it's best to figure out ways to reduce redundant processes.
- Make code readable. Type less: use HAML. You'll never worry about closing tags or not having valid markup.
- Useful tool for Linux users: GMate
- Useful framework for Ruby developers: Compass
- If you don't like the 24-column grid, you can use a grid generator. There are several grid generators written in several different languages. Notable ones are: Blueprint Grid CSS Generator and BlueGrid AIR
You may check out my blueprint css experiment here.
The rest of the text here is not relevant to my post on CSS frameworks. I just want to say that I plan to change my avatar when I reach the age of 23 to something happier. "Overwrought" has pretty much described my state since I started working after graduating from college. I'd like to change it to "Enlightened" soon as it is the word that describes my transformation as a person, as a designer and developer, as a socially-responsible individual.
A few months from now I will still be dedicated to learning and imparting what I know through my blog. Expect some interface and backend changes for this site soon. Since I'm still not very lucky in cards and not very lucky in finding a good full time job either, I prefer to keep myself happy and work on relevant projects. Thankfully, I am getting some Ruby on Rails projects.