twitter-bootstrap-with-html5-boilerplates-build

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Published February 20, 2012
Author
Michael Martinez
Title: Twitter Bootstrap with Html5 Boilerplate’s Build Date: 2012-02-20 17:12 Author: Michael Category: JavaScript Tags: ant, CSS, HTML5, Less, Mobile, Twitter Bootstrap Slug: twitter-bootstrap-with-html5-boilerplates-build Status: published
Twitter bootstrap is a great piece of kit. Html5 boilerplate (h5bp) is also a great piece of kit. Those of you who have used h5bp know it also comes bundled (or not?) with a great ant build script. This build script automagically builds, minifies, compresses, concatenates, lints and hints the files you specify. A ton of crap, really.
You will have to read the documentation as it makes some assumptions in regards to your project scaffolding and what-have-you. Seriously, read the documentation. You don’t have to trust me when I say its worth it, but it is.
So now that I found this script, I want to use it on every project. Once everything is set-up it is just so easy to run. I have forced myself to use it on trivial tests and what not. My lab page is a total work-in-progress and made with Twitter bootstrap. I thought I would show you how I integrated h5bp ant-build-script with it.
A screen shot of my folder structure inside webstorm:
notion image
As you can see, I mimicked the file structure that h5bp recommends in the documentation (RTFM, right?)
I then modified the project. properties file to include the changes you see here:
:::bash # project.properties file defines overrides for default.properties # Explanation: This file should be created by each user as and when he or she needs to override particular values. # Consequently, it should not be placed under version control. # Stylesheets # # Note: Stylesheets will be concatenated in the order they are listed in the file.stylesheets property (i.e. the last # file listed will be at the end of the concatenated file), so it probably makes sense to have the main style.css file # as the first entry # Example: # file.stylesheets = style.css, lightbox.css, plugin.css # file.stylesheets = bootstrap.css, style.css # Web Pages # # These are the pages (files) that will be served to users (.html, .php, .asp, etc). Files in this property will # be minified / optimised and have any stylesheet or javascript references updated to the minified examples # # The paths need to be relative # # Files can be added in a comma separated form file.pages = toolbox.html, vacapp.html # Excluded files and dirs # # Add any files or directories you add to the project and do not want to be copied to the publish directory as a # comma separated list # These files are ignored in addition to the default ones specified in default.properties. # Example: file.exclude = badfolder/** file.exclude = js/tests/**, style/less/**, # Bypassed JavaScript files and dirs # # Add any files or folders within the mylibs directory that you want to be copied to the publish directory as a # comma separated list # These files will not be concatenated or minimized and will simply be copied over as is. # Note: you cannot declare an empty file.bypass property, it would exclude the entire mylibs folder # Example: # file.js.bypass = widgets.js, gadgets.js, gidgets.js file.js.bypass = cafflab.js # Directory Structure # # Override any directory paths specific to this project # # dir.publish # dir.js #dir.js.libs = js/bootstrap #dir.js.mylibs = js/bootstrap dir.css = style/css # dir.img
Note: I’ve only included the actual changes to my file. The actual project.properties is a bit denser.
I haven’t gone all-the-way with the power of the build script thus far. As you can see, I am not fully concatenating my javascript and css files. However, they are fully linted, hinted and compressed which is better than nothing, I suppose. I will keep working and making refinements to this process, but I’ve seen the light with an intermediate build step in deployment. It is so full of win, that I can’t imagine doing it another way.
If you simply use build like I have, you will save a tremendous amount of time optimizing your pages for production. Once you see this in action… You will have a hard time turning back as well, I reckon.
Todo: Work out how to force the build script into nested directories for the manifest. Maybe even get a wild hair and attempt to write a pre build-build that analyzes the project structure.