UI Efficiency
06 Oct 2016User Interface Frameworks
The value that I can see in learning a UI Framework is that it allows you to be more efficient with your time and it can also make your code easier to read. In the beginning stages of learning a UI Framework, like Semantic UI, it can be quite difficult to grasp exactly how to use the many classes available to you. However, once you get into the rhythym of learning the classes, it becomes very easy to implement it into your own code. There are also some features of UI Frameworks that if you tried to replicate it by just using HTML and CSS it would take you a long time.
Utilize
One of the cool things about Semantic UI is that once you use a particular class in your code, you can now use that snippet of code for many different projects. When coding different websites, I found that the same Semantic UI classes could be used for different purposes. Websties are also very similar to eachother. Every website usually has a navigation bar at the top, a background image, and a footer at the bottom of the page displaying additional information. To use snippets of Semantic UI code, you simply copy it from one project to the next and change the values to display the correct information. Utilizing UI Frameworks can also decrease the amount of smaller classes that you would have to code if you were using just CSS.
My Experience
I was introduced to Semantic UI in 2016. At first I was somewhat skeptical about learning how to use Semantic because I kept thinking to myself "I don't want to do this". But that was the wrong mindset. Eventually I had to sit myself down and try to understand how Semantic UI works and how to use the classes. After a long time of repeating Semantic UI coding exercises I have a decent understanding of how to use classes like 'grid', 'topmenu', and 'container'. And after learning how to use these classes, I can not see the bigger picture of where I can apply them to. After replicating other websites using just Semantic UI, HTML, and CSS, I actually feel a little more confident that I might be able to one day create a really cool website of my own.
