Hi
Just wondering if Blocs (before I look at purchasing Blocs 3) outputs Sass, or you can edit Sass etc…
thanks
Blocs 3 is essentially an interface for Bootstrap 4, so that is what you are working with. There are various ways to modify all sorts of things in Blocs, but I think @Norm could give you the most qualified answer on this.
1 Like
Blocs isn’t really designed for users to be editing the output (Sass or not). You can’t do that edit inside the program and any edits done afterwards would be lost on the next export.
If you need that level of control and have that level of knowledge I’m not sure why you would need blocsapp in the first place.
Honestly @pauland I totally get where @mrcndrw is coming from. There is a hugely legitimate reason to use a tool like Blocs as a coder/developer. For me Blocs is a rapid design/ scaffolding tool. _I’m not saying that SASS is the next most valuable update at all, just speaking to the notion that professional developers wouldn’t be as interested in a tool like Blocs. @Norm
I’ve used Blocs to consolidate the discovery, wireframing and iterative stages for a client. Sure, I can make Bootstrap templates very easily without Blocs, but I use Blocs in the early stages of the build to get the layout and sitemap in front of the client quickly and make adjustments for the changes in content and layout that often come up. There are many such tools out there for professional coders/developers. It’s not about just replacing hand coding it’s about a professional workflow that allows you to focus on the rest of your job like integrations and CMS Implementations, SEM coding etc.
Blocs has an appeal for us coders and professional developers that is legit and if respected and nurtured could be great for both communities.
Remember Blocs is still quite young. It seems like non-coders are staking claim at the future of the product. I for one would like to see it continue to grow and embrace the coders/developers use cases as well. Blocs 3 is a great step in that direction but there is more that can help people like me.
Faster one click access to CSS/JS
Put that CSS/JS in a floating collapsable panel so it can stay open as needed.
Reordering of Header attachments.
2 Likes
Absolutely. I’m a coder myself.
I agree and understand why this would be appealing and I think it’s probably in a longer term plan for Blocs as a “pro” version. Norm has said that he wanted blocsapp to be a tool that was as easy to use as possible and primarily aimed at people who wouldn’t need to know the intricacies of HTML or CSS.
It’s not so much a case of non-coders staking a claim as blocsapp having the non-coding community as it’s initial target demographic. That may change. I feel it is changing but perhaps not as fast as some would like.
2 Likes
…and that is fair. It’s why I support the project even though I’ve not really needed it per se. When I initially purchased Blocs I was just curious. I didn’t use it in production for a long long time. I knew that demographic was the target so I held back on feedback because of that. On occasion I’d post about what I thought about this very topic, but I rarely if ever got anyone to talk about this, so thanks for engaging.
Anyway, V3 is fun.
Just curious @pauland, as a coder, what do you think about these recommendations?
- Faster one click access to CSS/JS
- Put that CSS/JS in a floating collapsable panel so it can stay open as needed.
- Reordering of Header attachments.
Entirely reasonable, but the access to CSS/JS should be to user code not stuff generated by blocsapp. Using the tool to hack the code is problematic, but enabling developers to over-ride/enhance the page is entirely reasonable.
In a previous life I might have taken blocsapp generated pages and post-processed them to embellish or change them. I used to do that to generate reports from a SQL database using a static page as the report template.
Since the ability exist already I’m not suggesting any changes other than ease of access. For those who aren’t good with css just do what they do now and ignore this capability.
Thanks for the feedback sir!
In a previous life I also used to use a technology - Adobe (Macromedia) Flex that was also based on XML markup (which is what HTML is). Adobe created a screen painter (ie blocsapp for Flex) and then in the latest revision of their Flex software, removed it. There was an absolute outcry, but I really didn’t care because it was pretty clear that people like me who were familiar with the markup preferred writing it directly rather than using the screen-painter. So us seasoned developers carried on regardless and beginners were distraught.
Coming back to blocsapp, Norm has done a far better job with blocsapp than Adobe did with the screen-painter of Flex, but my initial reaction about blocsapp using Sass was because just like my usage of Flex, I often meet web developers who hand-code their pages and prefer to do that because they know the technology so well, hence my wondering why blocsapp would appeal - it wouldn’t to many people I know.
I’m not privy to the internals of Norms thought process so we’ll need to see how blocsapp develops.
[ edit: Now I think of it, I think Adobe allowed source code edits, but would prevent edits to auto-generated code ]