what is a framework and should i use one?

[pinkvampyr]

what it says on the tin!

i dont really understand what a framework is but i understand it could help make coding a little easier? also if i should use one, which one do i use?

i dont know what anything is so if anyone wants to inform me of other things that are helpful i'd appreciate it lol.

[Memory]

What do you want to program? Any languages that you like already?

[Lyonid]

It really depends on what you are trying to do! I personally don't use them for creative projects. If you know that you will need one functionality on your site a lot, they are never a bad idea. Say, you have a blog that you plan on updating very frequently, it's nice to have a static site generator. If you plan on having a server with data on it, you may want to present it on your site with a good frontend framework. If you just want a small private site with fun images, a blog post here and there, some links and other personal stuff, just stick to raw HTML and CSS.

I wouldn't recommend learning to create a site by using frameworks. It removes a lot of the fun imho. If you got the basics down and have more ambitious project ideas where you don't want to type everything by hand in a pile of nested tags, start with looking into some basic frameworks that do what you would like to achieve. Just drop the ideas here and I am sure we can help out, haha!

[Melooon]

Put simply, within the context of a personal homepage or a web revival style site, no you don't wanna deal with frameworks.

My definition of a framework would be: a set of standardised rules and code blocks that allow for a more formal style of webdesign.

That's great if you are a company and need your website to be modular and have many (replaceable) employees working on it and agreeing on a set standard. However, that's totally the opposite of a web revival site 

Someone could make the argument that using a framework could allow a less skilled web crafter to create a more complex project than they would otherwise be able to do. That might be true, but as Lyonid says, that's not a good way to learn and you'd miss out on a lot of creative experimentation.

A blog is one of the rare examples where some sort of formal structure is a good idea! (Because blogs by their nature use a quite regular structure) - but if you're just starting out, I would use a hosted blog like smol.pub or Dreamwidth - that's much easier to get into!

That's not to say that frameworks can never be part of creative projects! If you are an expert with a particular framework and are already very skilled at web design, then you'll know if a framework is gonna allow you to accomplish what you wanna do - but if you don't know that in advance, then a framework is prob not correct for you