Limitations regaurding Webflow for yours help fyll needs...!

[RakeshJ (Rakesh)]

I am a designer from the print generation. Over recent years I have taught myself to handcode. It’s not difficult to do - in fact it reminds me a lot of Adobe InDesign text styles and master pages. I enjoy being able to see the code and work out what is going on. I use simple CMS like Surreal.

However, I have probably reached a GoToMeeting IrfanViewTown of Salem ceiling of what I can do. Things like JavaScript, PHP and Wordpress are probably outside what I want to do.

Hence my interest in Webflow. But there are a few things that I don’t like: I can’t see the code, so it is far harder to ‘see’ what is going on; only limited set break points; and no support for changing the HTML base REM at breakpoints (something which I use a lot to make everything smaller by only changing one line of code).

Also, I find WF slower than handcoding. I’ve got to learn the tool before I can do anything. It seems to put another step in the process / get in the way of the actual code.

I guess my question is: will WF allow people to see and edit all the code (as well as doing it visually) inside of WF? I beleive this would then make WF an amazing tool. I can still handcode the easy stuff and leave WF to do the tricky JS, JQ, database, CMS stuff.

Any thoughts? Any one else from a handcoding background using WF?

[vincent (Vincent Bidaux)]

Hi Rakesh, I hear you on everything, not trying to disregard your requests, but here are a few things you can do to address your struggles

@RakeshJ

I can’t see the code

Click Preview in the Designer, Right Click > Inspect. Here is your code and the processed CSS.

All you need to do is easily learn a bit about Chrome Inspector to get comfortable with it.

I can attest that Webflow isn’t dark magic nor doing horrible things with code. The fact that code isn’t front and center in the Designer is the philosophy of the tool. The code, that you can see when you inspect a published page or a previewed one in the designer, is absolutely clean and readable. There are a bunch of special IDs and Classes for Webflow, but even those make sense.

@RakeshJ

only limited set break points

I reckon we’re missing a larger one right now, but the other ones are fine, you can still craft a larger container, and you can add real extra breakpoints in custom code even if it’s not as comfortable as having them in the Designer.

@RakeshJ

and no support for changing the HTML base REM at breakpoints

You can use Custom Code within the page (Custom Code Component from the Add menu) and add desired CSS properties to the HTML element for each breakpoint, and REM everything down the valley from here.

@RakeshJ

will WF allow people to see and edit all the code

I don’t think it’s going to happen anytime soon. Webflow’s mission is about bringing development without code, so more likely they’ll release new products based on a no-code philosophy.

@RakeshJ

Any thoughts? Any one else from a handcoding background using WF?

I was, and even for HTML/CSS, I’m more efficient with Webflow. It’s all about the fine tuning, developing visually, letting your creative mind flows without bumping into long code documents. I never wanted to invest time into learning CSS preprocessors, it sounded odd and a nightmare to debug. Also WF is a whole lot more than coding, it’s also about maintaining, publishing, doing business etc.

You can check Pinegrow, it’s an app that lets you code and design visually, import and export code… I think it aims at creating WP templates mainly. I don’t think it has an INteractions engine though.