Think twice about using a Framework. But not really..

Do you remember the first time a friend/peer told you about a web framework? I don’t. For what felt like a long time I was in the dark when it came to the power of Frameworks. For me it was just one of those terms that when you hear it you nod your head and utter a response along the lines of “Oh yea! Of course, they’re the best!”.

But are they really? Everyone talks about them as if they’re going to add years to your life but in my experience they’ve brought along as many questions as they have answers. So what’s the hype? Why is everyone so stoked about them? For a moment we’ll take a shallow dive into the pro’s and con’s.

We’ll start with the positives. Developers like to be lazy. Frameworks are great for streamlining your styling process. They offer libraries, templates, session management capabilities and are compatible with a variety of browsers. In fewer words, frameworks allow you to focus more so on the functionality and user experience rather than grappling with a technology that likes to play hard to get. And while it may sound lazy to depend on pre-written code to develop your own ideas, that doesn’t mean it’s a short term solution. Frameworks are easy to adopt when a project is handed over from developer to developer, easy to maintenance, can be easily upgraded.

All this sounds great. So what’s the issue? Honestly there isn’t much of an issue with Frameworks, they’re great! But I got bullied by the Semantic Framework this week, and right about now my spirit animal sounds like the parents at Sea World asking for their money back because Tilikum didn’t feel like doing cart-wheel for little Timmy. I want my time back!