New Book: “The Little Book of HTML/CSS Frameworks”

Published on March 4, 2015 (↻ February 5, 2024), filed under Web Development (RSS feed for all categories).

This book, released in 2015, lives on in a lovingly updated and extended remake: Check out The Little Book of Little Books on Amazon, Apple Books, Kobo, Google Play Books, Leanpub, and Gumroad.

It’s out! My new book, The Little Book of HTML/CSS Frameworks, is now available. I myself have been surprised by the sudden release, and while I’m still unsure about how print copies can be obtained (the book is being printed), the book can now be downloaded for free at O’Reilly.

The book gives a quick introduction into web frameworks for both users and developers. As you could tell earlier, much emphasis is on quality and tailoring. Here are a few more facts.

Format and price	Ebook, free
	Paperback, currently not available
Extras	Foreword by Eric A. Meyer
Length	42 pages (PDF)
ISBN	978-1-4919-2016-9

Description

With the speed of web development today, it’s little wonder that so many frameworks are available, since they come with a promise of saving development and design time. But using the wrong framework, or wrongly using the right framework, can be costly. This concise book shares higher-level ideas around web development frameworks that govern HTML and CSS code, whether you’re looking at an external option or planning to build your own.

Author Jens Meiert outlines various principles, methods, and practices that you can use to make sure your framework has the functionality you need without bloated code to slow you down.

• Choose a framework that can be tailored and extended.
• Stick to framework ground rules: follow the documentation and don’t overwrite framework code.
• Build a framework by means of a prototype: a static internal website that includes all the page types and elements you need.
• Focus on quality assurance during the development process, and quality control to find and fix framework issues.
• Diligently maintain and update your framework, whether it’s for internal or external use.
• Anchor your documentation right where development happens.

Jens Oliver Meiert is a former senior developer and tech lead at Google, Aperto, and GMX, where he architected internal frameworks that married fast development with high quality code.

❧ Special thanks go to Tony for his thorough first feedback, as well as Eric for his most kind introduction. But I thank more people, many times, in the book’s acknowledgments. I’m excited for I distilled most of my frameworks expertise into this book—and so I hope other fellow web developers can enjoy and take something out of it.

About Me

I’m Jens, and I’m an engineering lead and author. I’ve worked as a technical lead for companies like Google and as an engineering manager for companies like Miro, I’m close to W3C and WHATWG, and I write and review books for O’Reilly and Frontend Dogma.

With my current move to Spain, I’m open to a new remote frontend leadership position. Feel free to review and refer my CV or LinkedIn profile.

I love trying things, not only in web development, but also in other areas like philosophy. Here on meiert.com I share some of my views and experiences.

Comments (Closed)

1. On March 4, 2015, 19:02 CET, Steven Bradley said:

   Nice Jens. I’ve already downloaded the book and I’m looking forward to reading it.

2. On March 5, 2015, 1:06 CET, Pedro said:

   This is great. Congratulationes!

3. On March 5, 2015, 1:42 CET, Orlando Pozo said:

   Great dude, congrats!

4. On March 7, 2015, 23:03 CET, Job Roberto said:

   Congrats!!

   Do you have more info on the paperback version?

5. On March 9, 2015, 15:04 CET, Chris Law said:

   Thank you!

6. On March 9, 2015, 15:16 CET, Jens Oliver Meiert said:

   Cheers everyone!

   @Job, unfortunately I don’t have any information on the paperback yet. I’ll update the table above once I do.