Guide to CodeKit: Top Web Development Tool on the Market
Bryan Jones, the CodeKit creator, has written a guest post. For the past few years, I've been using CodeKit, and I have talked a lot about it. It altered the landscape of front-end development, in my affection, by making it simple to use sophisticated or Web Development Tool that, despite their strength, felt out of reach to many. Now that CodeKit 2.0 is available, which has kept up with the front-end development landscape, it gives us more potent tools that would be difficult to use otherwise. Bryan will provide the introduction, and I'll chime in occasionally to add my thoughts after using 2.0 for the past few weeks.
What exactly is CodeKit?
CodeKit is a program that allows you to create websites more quickly. It includes all the most recent languages, such as Sass, Less, Stylus, and Coffee Script. It refreshes your browsers in real-time. It combines, minifies, and checks the syntax of JavaScript. It will even optimize images. Everything that expedites your website's load time and your workflow.
Although there are CodeKits alternative methods, CodeKits goal is to make the process less painful. You launch the CodeKit app and drag your project folder into it. There are no JSON folders to edit and no software to install and download. There are no commands to remember. It simply works.
What's New in Version?
To begin with, I employed a developer (Guy Meyer) to make the user interface (UI) look less like it'd been repeatedly bashed with only a DOS 5.1 guide. The new version performs significantly better in team settings as well as running 1,400% faster as a result of numerous optimizations.
However, how it can help you become faster is what matters most to you. Here are the top four new features that will have an immediate impact rather than listing them all:
Refresh All Browsers
Your website must look good on a variety of devices. On an iPhone, iPad, Galaxy S3, Chrome, Firefox, and even IE 11 on a PC, you can access it. There are a lot of refresh buttons to press. CodeKit can help you with that.
All of these devices, as well as others, will now be live-refreshed by CodeKit. Change something in your code, and every device instantly updates to reflect the change. There are no plugins or complicated configurations. It is compatible with advanced sites such as WordPress and Drupal. Merely choose the CodeKit Preview option in CodeKit, copy the URL, and paste it into your other devices. Once you've seen it in action, you'll never work without it again.
Bower
Bower makes it easy to install over 7,000 components, including jQuery, Modernize, Bootstrap, and even WordPress. Bower is now integrated into CodeKit you can access those resources with just two clicks. Open the Assets section, choose the components you want, and then click the cloud icon. CodeKit downloads the most recent versions and any necessary dependencies from the web and inserts them directly into your project.
When it comes time to update components, CodeKit saves you time. Only navigate to the Assets section and select the Installed tab. It will display the current version of every constituent in your project jointly with the most recent one is currently online.
Autoprefixer
Vendor prefixes are CSS guidelines that only IE6 engineers could adore. Autoprefixer web development tool makes them comfortable, and it's now included in CodeKit. Only write standard CSS, and Autoprefixer will add all required distributor prefixes according to the most up-to-date personal data about each browser. It is compatible with Less, Sass, and Stylus. It's also completely customizable: only tell it which browsers you want to support, and it'll do the rest.
Note from Chris: I accept Autoprefixer is roughly as important as CodeKit itself, & the two are a perfect match. While I still like preprocessors, I no longer use them for prefixing. Autoprefixer is a far superior solution.
Libsass
You're presumably familiar with Sass if you're reading CSS Tricks. Compilation takes a few seconds, respectable? Not any longer. When you enable Libsass in CodeKit, your Sass will compile instantly. The new Sass compiler Libsass is written in C rather than Java, resembling Justin Bieber tanking his multi-billion dollar singing career.
The new 3.3 syntax additions & some formed Sass features (like namespaces) are not supported regardless because Libsass is still in beta. However, Libsass is making quick progress, and this summer is the target date for achieving full parity. You can use it frankly now and significantly speed up your work unless you're doing something extremely complex. (It was used on CodeKits site, which has some cutting-edge CSS.)
Comments