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General Discussion

Posted by lakindujayathilaka
lakindujayathilaka
15,244 Points

manual coding vs frameworks...discussion

I am doing the front end and back end of my social networking website manually from scratch without using any frameworks.

is this a good approach? i have written about 13300 lines of code manually. Most people tell me not to use framework for large websites like social networks. I know its true but tell me some proofs/facts regarding this matter

liam johnshon
liam johnshon
Courses Plus Student 904 Points

according to me it is good to create a website without any framework because with framework we're unable to create exact layout what we want to create for our website

lakindujayathilaka
lakindujayathilaka
15,244 Points

exactly! thanks for the comment

1 Answer

Kevin Korte
Kevin Korte
28,148 Points
Kevin Korte
Kevin Korte
28,148 Points

I guess first we need to know if we are talking about back end frameworks, or front end frameworks. In regards to back end frameworks.

I disagree, I think that most all sites will benefit from a framework. (Treehouse is built on a framework).

When you use a framework, you're getting code that has between written, and re-written by our peers. Frameworks help get you off the ground, using best practice, code standards, and extensive work in finding and squashing bugs and vulnerabilities because there are so many other developers crawling over this code every day, things get fixed and patched relatively fast.

Back end frameworks do not come with views, of any sort, so what you do on the front end is up to you. Generally what a back end framework provides is way to get data in, and get data out of a database, and defining routes around your site. That's generally it, the rest is up to you to code.

In front end frameworks, I generally agree. It's okay to use a framework, especially at first since you again are getting the most consistent, and bug free front end as you can get, but as you site matures, it should probably move away from being framework heavy at least. And the other trick is to not let the framework dictate the design.

That's my opinion on them.

lakindujayathilaka
lakindujayathilaka
15,244 Points

i respect your opinion :) My opinion is similar to urs...frameworks are good to get a start up and to lay out the foundation. But it has many limitations. Thats why i am doing my project manually on both front end and back end. It gives me more flexibility. For example....take an api...can we add rules to youtube api? no..thats a limitation.

The best thing is to do the job our way even if its the hard way :).

Kevin Korte
Kevin Korte
28,148 Points
Kevin Korte
Kevin Korte
28,148 Points

Let's leave front end frameworks alone for right now, cause they pose their own problem at times.

On the back end, to make sure I understand, whether you are using a framework or you're not, you can't change what's available on the youtube api. That belongs to youtube, so I don't understand the example, in regards to back end frameworks.

I recently messed around setting up the stripe payment api to work with the ruby on rails framework. I still had to write all of the api calls inside of the rails framework to make it work with stripe payments.

A backend framework at it's core is usually nothing more than a way to tie views to databases with routes. And that's incredibly powerful.

Some of the bigger frameworks even have fantastic database migration tools to help ensure multiple developers working on a project all have the exact same database layout. A good framework is very extensionable, flexiable, and saves a ton for a developer.

But, to build from scratch, to learn how these tools really work, is a fine thing. I support the idea, just understand backend frameworks have a solid place in development. They are not a crutch.

Treehouse, and Github are on the Rails framework.