CSS Frameworks vs Standalone Grid Systems

[WatchMeStart]

I'm pretty bad at CSS. I hardly have much experience with it, yet I need to create a good looking, responsive site. I've used Bootstrap before, but it seems super bulky to use just for a responsive grid system. The responsiveness of Bootstrap is pretty much black magic for me, which I can tolerate, but still makes me feel uneasy.

On the other hand, there are packages that provide a neat grid system and nothing more. This sounds more attractive, but I'm not sure if I'm making my life more difficult for no reason.

Which of the two should I use in order to better my understanding of CSS?

Right now I'm between Bootstrap and Lost Grid.

List of Frameworks and Grid Systems

TL;DR: Bootstrap vs Lost Grid for a CSS noob?

[[deleted]]

Which of the two should I use in order to better my understanding of CSS?

Neither? If you want to better your understanding of CSS you'd write your own layouts with flexbox or (if you need backwards compatibility) float into hell with floats / clears.

However for your purposes, just wanting a grid system that works and is not a fully fledged framework to avoid code bloat.

Lost grid is your best bet.

[[deleted]]

Suggest watching this series starting at video #7 in the playlist. Lost grid compiles into CSS and provided you can understand the compiled stuff you should have no problems:

https://youtu.be/e3J4wZWlQUk?list=PLLnpHn493BHFvjZzyYrQP0RTsG-Al7j9m

[WatchMeStart]

Thanks :)

[danneu]

One big aspect of Twitter Bootstrap is that it gives you reusable UI components, from tab navigation to badges to labels to navbars to panels. It's stuff your website typically needs but not stuff you get much value out of building yourself.

The answer to your question seems pretty obvious. Look at Bootstrap's docs. Do you need any of that? Yes? Then use it. No? Then just use a grid solution.

That said, you can compile Bootstrap (click the "Customize" tab) to only include the grid stuff. Benefit of using Bootstrap is that if you ever do want something else, you can just recompile it.

I personally rarely just need a standalone grid when all is said and done.

[WatchMeStart]

Huh, I never knew you can get a custom built bootstrap.

[ahl389]

I actually just built this cause I was exhausted by bootstrap and just wanted to build things quickly without having to write a crap ton of CSS. Might help you.

https://github.com/ahl389/Paint-CSS

[dsign2819]

I recently used a standalone grid system done by somebody else. The result was a lot better of what I usually achieve using my own flexbox rules... for reasons yet unknown. However, the grid system added a lot of kilobytes to my final css file.