Structure CSS the Object Oriented Way
For developers looking to streamline their CSS with minimal effort, the BEM methodology is a game-changer:
- Simplicity: BEM’s clear naming conventions make your CSS easier to understand and maintain, even for big projects.
- Scalability: Modular design means you can reuse components effortlessly, reducing redundancy and errors.
- Efficiency: Spend less time debugging and more time developing with BEM’s straightforward structure.
The idea is to, as the name says, build a modular CSS system.
- Blocks: These are standalone entities that are meaningful on their own, such as a header, container, or menu.
- Elements: Parts of a block that have no standalone meaning and are semantically tied to their block, for example, a menu item in a navigation block.
- Modifiers: Flags on blocks or elements used to change appearance, behavior, or state, such as disabled, highlighted, or active.
These components help in building a structured, easy-to-maintain CSS architecture.
Other methods would be:
- SMACSS (Scalable and Modular Architecture for CSS)
- OOCSS (Object-Oriented CSS)
- SUITCSS (Structured Class Names)
- Atomic (Small Building Blocks - like Lego)
More Information: BEM CSS.
TL;DR
- Structured CSS becomes more and more import as the codebase grows
- BEM is one way to structure your CSS in a maintainable way