@Jack I agree entirely with you about the resource heavy websites and how frameworks seem to take the blame but if you look at the file size for the images, etc a lot of the time the framework is the least of the issue with page speed!
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Exactly that @Rob
Certain people dislike frameworks (especially bootstrap) but instead of accepting why they are popular, they suggest a few kb is causing bloat and slow loading when in reality it isnât the framework, its the big generic stock photos and annoying animation! and whatever other plug-ins are taking an age to load!
Youâre the man of clean code (as far as I remember) - thatâs excellent.
But why not minding about a âgrid-systemâ rather than a framework? I mean it would dry out your code and you can slightly pull design-styles in (even taking stuff cross-framework).
I have nothing against frameworks (I love them but never used one though), just a concern:
âEvolving web is separating content and position from design. Frameworks are merging those disciplines together!â
Thatâs the reason why I currently (try to) build my own grid-system. Itâs absolutely not better as everything in the market yet (I suppose itâs even worse). But itâs mine.
Cheers
Thomas
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@Thomas is that tongue in cheek lol I wouldnât say âiâm the man of clean codeâ more Iâm approaching this in a way that allows me to build websites that offer visitors an enjoyable experience, rather than an annoying bloated experience.
One of the main reasons I use frameworks is because of Pinegrow. Visual design with easy access to frameworks and a quick way to make adjustments, test and perfect a website Iâm working on. I work best when I enjoy the process and all credit to you for attempting to build your own framework.
I only returned to web/graphic design as of last year, so maybe once I truly master html5 & CSS, I will look into my own framework but I wasnât suggesting you (or anyone else on here) had an issue with frameworks, more certain individuals on the www who have a tendency to first attack the size of a framework, instead of looking at other aspects.
Quote from that article that we should all take note of (including me 
)
That is, donât be so quick to write off something as being bloated simply because it doesnât align with whatever philosophy, vision, or decision that you personally have for a project. Just because something includes an option (or set of options) that you donât use doesnât mean itâs generally bloated.
Being overkill for your needs is not the same as thing as being bloated.
and I go back to what I said about user experience. If a developer is avoiding bootstrap because they claim its bloated, yet the website they developed is slow loading due to other resources, surely they need to re-think their approach to building websites for their visitors.
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I spent years learning HTML and CSS with a single mindedness that not only was I going to understand it so well that I was going to roll my own framework and be known world-wide for my efforts only to realise that I was inventing the wheel. With a little bit of effort with either BS of Foundation I could customise it to be what I was looking for happy in the knowledge someone else was looking after those thing like browser compatibility! I know I could go along way towards creating a framework for my projects but why bother introducing the headache when taking everything into consideration.
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I would agree in most cases a more Vanilla development approach is all that is needed. I still stand by my comment above:
( ^ I am not referring to anyone on the forum however, just speaking in general terms 
so relax people )
@jack you bring up a good point concerning bloat elsewhere with images and added resources.
The lack of proper image compression, linting, etc., etc., wastes a tremendous amount of both time and bandwidth for users everyday, when you add it all up over time the calculated spoilage is a shame to all of us. As we could all do better as designers and developers, I am sure it holds true for most all of us.
@rob, just curious, what aspects of the frameworks do you rely upon mostly?
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Certainly creating your own grid-system is kind of reinventing the wheel over and over again. But there is one thing that could be probably considered as well:
âWaiting on developers and authorsâ - Or âDepending on themâ. Just to name flex-box or css grid layout. Iâd like to understand both (or skip them) and Iâd like to increase my knowledge the best I can. Currently it is even unsure if Pinegrow V3 release depends on Bootstrap 4 release (however I donât think that it is the case).
Whatever it is:
Iâd like to strengthen the position of âworking from scratch in Pinegrow!â And I think there is enough room for doing so. In Freeway we never had any chance using a framework at all. So sweet memories might come into game as well.
I adopted Pinegrow to substitute FreewayPro as my tool of creating the mark-up. And it is sensational cool, an outstanding tool - probably one of my best decision ever.
Bloated stuff namely images are my concern as well. I can do whatever I want: My hero-images are rarely beyond 100k. Generated out of PS â running CodeKitâs internal image compression on them as part of my workflow is what I do. Fortunately, images are loaded asynchronously - they donât block rendering the page. But it is a waste anyway.
Last summer I read Scott Jehlâs âResponsible Responsive Designâ (A Book Apart) and there, he introduced the idea of âPerformance Budgetâ.
An excerpt:
" ⌠That said, the basic idea is sound: a performance budget is a number, or set of numbers, used as a guideline for whether you can afford a particular code addition to a codebase, or whether an existing siteâs performance needs to improve. These numbers can represent page transfer weight (âpage should weigh no more than X kilobytes and make no more than Y requestsâ), or perceived load time (âpage should be usable in X seconds or lessâ) âŚ"
Cheers
Thomas
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If you asked me what I would miss if I had to design/build a website without a framework, it would be Responsive grid/menu - that is it.
Ease of use and if I wanted too, I could look at other options but why should I? and that isnât an aggressive question! (so donât worry mate!) more, what do I gain by looking at other options?
I already design mainly using plain HTML/CSS, so if I drop bootstrap and foundation, all Iâm doing is taking my focus elsewhere when it would be silly to ignore the popularity of bootstrap.
Say for examplle I want to start selling templates online, itâs either bootstrap or wordpress and I dislike wordpress, yet Iâm considering upgrading, just so I can build wordpress themes.
It always comes back to the question âwhy should I?â - if there is ever a valid reason then I will move away from frameworks, but currently there is no reason at all!
Ok.
Well regardless, perhaps much like your eventual acceptance and then excitement regarding Foundation, perhaps there is a chance to likewise see the benefits of other approaches as well in the future. Itâs perhaps not as drastic of an undertaking as you may expect.
You can never go wrong with this approach.
@Thomas PS: I quickly passed by the FreewayPro forum yesterday and saw a user posted concerning an email they received about a forthcoming announcement regarding SoftPress and FreewayPro. Did you receive such an email also? I found that to be interesting, and I am curious what may occur in the near future? If you hadnât seen it I thought you may find it interesting.
Hi,
yep - recognized this post, too. I havenât received such an email, being in touch with Joe over years though.
Obviously, Iâm not as prominent as the guy getting it (sounds a bit like fake-news (whereâs the button?).
Seriously spoken, there will be certainly the time of a final decision or result. I donât expect bigger surprises.
Cheers
Thomas
OK
Foundation is just a framework, same as Bootstrap, the real âexcitementâ is over CSS design and HTML5. I started using Materialize last week, what do you think happened? Itâs just a framework.
I improve my knowledge when there is a need for that knowledge, otherwise IMO you become one of these people that wants to be knowledgeable regarding every aspect but you canât master one area.
I can build three websites, upload three websites and ask you, which one is Foundation, which one is Bootstrap and which one is Materialize - now without viewing the source code it would just be a guess, unless I used out-of the-box components (which I rarely do) as I have my own customised version of each framework.
Now PInegrow_User I would ask you to upload some of your work, but you havenât, ever! and I would actually like to see your work, if youâre using your own framework or an alternative and thatâs the same to anyone, show us a reason to change and me and @Rob may consider changing lol
A lot of that now days.
One comment from that discussion
âYeah Bootstrap is good for prototyping and other things, but its get so problematic when you try to customise it heavily.â
I donât find it problematic to customise Bootstrap or Foundation? Iâm not running into the same problems others are, problems that drive them to building their own framework, but I always say, do what suits you, donât follow others.
Well I could likewise state that little has been proven for the necessity of using a framework if all you need is a responsive grid and a menu, as you put it âthat is itâ, regarding all you need from a framework.
So I would have little desire to try to convince others, especially those staunch against things already. You will however continue to arrive at new ideas, just as you continue to do so through your own continued discoveries and explorations. Plenty of debates already abound, I am not seeking to start a new one. I thought my previous response was relatively neutral and encouraging, perhaps not.
Yeah of course, I thought this as I was typing but what about the features already integrated within PInegrow and software we both use, such as bootstrap studio and bootstrap blocks? I was looking through my library in bootstrap studio and being able to casually drop these blocks into a page, it tips the balance in favour of bootstrap for certain websites.
Plenty of debates already abound, I am not seeking to start a new one. I thought my previous response was relatively neutral and encouraging, perhaps not.
Itâs just interesting hearing from posters who contribute to the forum as your knowledge of the subject may be greater than others, and I am actually interested in seeing your work or hearing your views and sorry if it came across as aggressive but we all have different posting styles!
No worries, good discussion.
Obviously there are pros and cons to all points of views, methods and even opinions. So in the end itâs up the each developer/designer to weigh those costs and benefits on a per project and per client basis. Then arriving at those decisions based on the merits they themselves determine, which can be vast and vary greatly.
If I have time and the desire I will put forth a comprehensive perspective of my present point of view. But in the end honestly, I suspect we all come to our own continuous conclusions anyway, as the industry constantly advances around us.
Thus the learning, discovery and exploration never seems to cease.
At first I thought the original poster was a my level so I was eager to see what others said. Then I realized he had skills beyond my own at this moment and started to lose focus.
What people often fail to realize is that their interest level is relative to a point just above their skill level. The brain wants to grow but not explode.
When I read what to me is currently gibberish I quickly pass it by until I find that sweet spot of helpful consideration that is found by proper reference to words that Google can find. Thatâs not specifically thoughtful SEO but simply adding relevant words and phrases so I can find the gem.
I will never be a brainiac coder or dream in CSS but Pinegrow at least lets me develop sites that donât need to be rewritten every five years or less. I started in Frontpage, went to Dreamweaver, dabbled in Xara Designer and now I have something powerful that drives me crazy but eventually gives me more than I expected.
I need it now more than ever since Google is punishing me for have a site that is not responsive for mobile use. Having to create a .mobi site on top of it all would take longer than I have to live.
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Well, after following these posts on Pinegrow and knowing what I need to get done if using a web editor, I realized that Pinegrow is just too primitive at this time for me to use. I KNOW what I want the website to look like and do and I actually need a web editor to do the coding for me.
When I found out how many steps and the hassle it is just to change the background color to a webpage, I knew that Pinegrow needs a lot of work before it can be something I would be willing to use. Rather than spending my very hard earned money on a program I simply can not use, I think I will be spending the money on Sparkle instead.
I need a web editing program that does the coding for me, rather than me doing the coding for it.
Excellent decision - or alternative, you could keep Freeway up (Phoenix-like as recently announced)
Cheers
Thomas