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Using Responsive Design Frameworks

In previous article we talked about creating responsive designs that addresses all devices and fit nicely on each of them. It is a tricky task and you need to invest lot of time in finalizing the layout. Along with code writing in CSS and HTML, you continuously need to test the design at various sizes and orientations. You need to do lots of mathematical calculations to adjust the widths. For a professional designer, it is a real challenging task. However, clients may not be ready to invest such a long time and money. Responsive design frameworks come to your help and make your life easier. In essence, you do not need to reinvent the wheel to build your vehicle. Using frameworks and themes is a debatable topic and many developers are in favor of using customized solutions written from scratch. They argue over disadvantages of using ready-made codes –

Framework hampers performance of your website/application.
Your website design becomes “one-of” thousands websites designed and developed using the same framework, you lack uniqueness.
With thousands of lines in CSS and JS, it is difficult to keep the code sane and clean.

In contrast to above opinions, developers working on frameworks are increasing and this trend is expected to continue in the future too. When one writes down the benefits and drawbacks of using a good, structured framework, benefits certainly weigh more. In this article, let us see few popular frameworks that give you cutting edge responsive designs that work well across all screens.

Bootstrap

Bootstrap is one of the widely used front-end development framework which supports responsive design. It is one of the feature-rich responsive design frameworks which power many web projects. It is flexible enough to let you work as per your design visualization. Following main features of Bootstrap make it smart choice for professional website designers or developers.

Speedy development- Main objective of any framework is cut down developer’s time and efforts to push a new website. Bootstrap achieves this objective to its best possible level by providing a ready-made block structure and developer can save initial website setup efforts. With a website based on Bootstrap framework you can address every device that can be used for surfing internet. Your website will equally look nice and load quickly on all possible gadgets right from tiny wearables to widest smart televisions.

Here is a brief summary about Bootstrape in table format

Top Features :

Free Download, Documentation, Tutorials, Free Themes and Other Components, Paid Themes with customization, Browser Compatibility, Featured Websites Built with Bootstrape

Places To Get This :

http://getbootstrap.com/ Latest Version 2.3.2, Getting Started with Bootstrap, Bootswatch.com, WrapBootstrap, Internet Explorer, FireFox, Chrome, Safari, iPhone, http://www.ansonika.com/learn/, craftnodehosting.com, jobatdoor.com,www.strongest-privacy.com and many more

If you are wordpress or Joomla lover, then you can get integratee Bootstrap with Joomla at Joostrap and Wordpress Twitter Bootstrap CSS component will allow adding responsive features on your Wordpress website.

Foundation –

The website claims that “Foundation is most advanced responsive design framework available as yet” and yes it is so true. Features included in this framework help you learn the things faster and so your work speeds up dramatically. Designing attractive, fully functional and device-independent website becomes easy task for you and your team. Foundation is robust responsive framework approved by hundreds of web designers and developers.

A strong and robust grid system is at the base of Foundation framework. Fluid grid with 12 columns give you wide scope to arrange all design elements. Widths for columns are defined in percentage and all you have to do is to select appropriate classes from the pre-prepared CSS files. You are not required to write/alter any CSS at all.

Features tables –

Free Download

http://foundation.zurb.com/

Documentation, Tutorials

http://designshack.net/articles/css/a-beginners-guide-to-zurb-foundation-3-the-grid/

http://foundation.zurb.com/learn/training.html

Free Themes and Other Components

http://foundation.zurb.com/templates.html

Paid Themes with customization

Browser Compatibility

Internet Explorer, FireFox, Chrome, Safari, iPhone

Featured Websites Built with Bootstrape

http://foundation.zurb.com/learn/website-examples.html

Bootstrap and Foundation are two popular responsive design frameworks and here we have taken a brief review of these two frameworks. In our next article, lets see how to implement some basic designs with Bootstrap as well as Foundation.

Do get in touch with us if you want to know more about responsive web development, we are Helios Solutions, an IT Outsourcing company in India offering Responsive Web Development Services to clients all across the globe.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Helios Solutions .