What is Bootstrap and when should I use it?

Bootstrap makes it quick to build responsive websites.

Free and open source software offers us multiple alternatives for many things. This makes it difficult to know which one is best to use. Let's start by saying that if you don't need a website you don't need to know what it is Bootstrap and when it should be used.

In the old days, to make a website you could get by just fine with notepad or even a word processor, but as youe the pages were gaining in interactivity and the content had to be updated more frequently, it became necessary to use new tools to create them

What is Bootstrap and when should I use it?

On the one hand, visual editors such as Macromedia (later Adobe) Dreamweaver appeared that allowed you to write code as well as visually edit content. In Linux we had tools like Kompozer or NVU that, although they didn't have the same features, made the task quite easy.

If you were good at writing code, there was no shortage of tools. Anjuta or Eclipse were ideal development environments for expert programmers.

Over time, content managers appeared as WordPress, Drupal o JoomlaThis type of software made it possible to disregard code writing to focus on content creation.. They turned out to be the ideal alternative for places like Linux Adictos in which several authors are constantly updating the content.

Let me explain this a bit.

From the point of view of coding, a web page includes:

  • Document type: It tells the browser which version of HTML is being used.
  • HTML container: It tells the browser the start and end of the HTML document and can include additional information such as the language.
  • Head Container: It includes useful information for the browser and search engines such as the title of the page, the author, a brief description of the content and a list of relevant terms. Also, it tells the browser where to find instructions on how to render the content on the screen.
  • Body Container: Here goes all the content that the user will see in the browser.
  • Script statement: It tells the browser where to find instructions in certain programming languages ​​such as Javascript or PHP that allow you to add interactivity or send forms by mail.

The different parts of a document inside the Body container are:

  • header: This is where the title of the website is displayed. It may contain the logo, links, navigation bar or other prominent information.
  • Navigation: This container is used to create a navigation menu that gives access to the main parts of the site.
  • Article: The name is quite descriptive of the function. It is used to differentiate different topics within a web page. For example, this post that follows on the main page of Linux Adictos.
  • Section: Separate the different parts of an article.
  • Hold: Groups the content displayed on the side of the page.
  • Footers: Shows the information at the bottom of the page. It is often used to display information such as directions, links to other sites, and repeating the menu.

There are containers to mark different parts of the text as h (1 to 6) op that indicate titles and paragraphs respectively.

If there were no content managers, every time the authors of Linux Adictos We would like to publish an article, we would have to rewrite the entire page code from scratch.  In addition, we should manually update the order of the main page and the list of articles by category.

And, if the administrators were to do a redesign or a new screen size came up, it would be necessary to update the style sheets.

The problem of content managers

Although content managers are ideal in the conditions we mentioned, they are a waste of resources in the case of sites that are not frequently updated, such as corporate or informational websites with few changes.  On the other hand, they include the use of databases and their popularity makes them the object of frequent attacks, which requires them to be updated.

In the particular case of WordPress, in my opinion it is becoming bloatware. More and more themes require the installation of add-ons that in many cases fulfill the same function as the ones you already had installed. And, most of the best benefits are under the payment method. And, they're not exactly cheap.

This is where open source frameworks like Bootstrap come in handy.  Think of Bootstrap as a box of Lego bricks that instead of building things are used to build websites that easily adapt to all screen sizes. You don't need to reinvent the wheel as it comes with almost everything you may need like buttons, icons and themes. But, at the same time you have the flexibility so that your designs do not look like others.

In the next article we will see how to use it.


3 comments, leave yours

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  1.   Richard Watterson said

    An interesting article, although I think the appropriate title would be content managers and current problems, here they did not explain anything about bootstrap.
    Besides…
    Bootstrap is a library/framework/library that allows us to design very nice responsive sites, you can create a website without knowing much about CSS, you can create a WordPress theme, but you should put a lot of time into it to optimize it to the maximum.
    CMS like WordPress are designed to improve the maintenance of a website, that's why they are so flexible, you can make blogs, business websites, shops, forums, etc etc... and all without touching a single line of code.
    Themes in the case of WordPress, there are many quite simple, suitable for a personal blog, something that does not require more visual appeal. In the case of "attractive" themes, these usually include plugins, which provide the themes with greater functionality, you can add loaders, mega menus, animations, and more, very rarely do the plugins include CSS.
    That is why…
    1.- Avoid using the whole bootstrap package, load only what you need.
    2.- For WordPress, invest in a good hosting, this will improve your loading times, you can choose to use a CDN to improve the loading of your themes.
    3.- If you use a CMS based on PHP, don't expect great speeds, it is true that they can be optimized, but someone with knowledge must do it.
    4.- The development and maintenance of a WordPress theme is not necessarily cheap or easy. There are many vulnerabilities being discovered daily and solving them without the proper knowledge can be complicated, investing in a template from an experienced editor may be the most appropriate, of course, it's a matter of economy, but it's worth it.

    1.    Diego German Gonzalez said

      It is the first article in the series.
      Thanks for your input

    2.    George said

      Nice article. I will wait for the sequel.