I don't know if this is wanted, but maybe users can extend Bootstrap Studio with plugins? So it is possible that users who can perhaps contribute and help through plugins. The idea came to me, when I opened my WebStorm, since Jet Brains offers this possibility also with its IDE.
Some quick questions?
How long have you used Bootstrap Studio?
How many websites have you built with it?
Do you build websites for a living, and if so, do you use Bootstrap Studio as your main program?
How long have you used Bootstrap Studio? Since a few days
How many websites have you built with it? One website so far
Do you build websites for a living, and if so, do you use Bootstrap Studio as your main program? Yes building websites is my livelihood. No I do not use it as a main program, but as a layout program.
Logic and background services cannot be created with BSS. Therefore VisualStudio, WebStorm, Rider IntelliJ and Visual Studio code is used as needed.
What do these questions have to do with my idea?
I don’t know if this is wanted,
yes
but maybe users can extend Bootstrap Studio with plugins?
no
So it is possible that users who can perhaps contribute and help through plugins.
no
The idea came to me, when I opened my WebStorm, since Jet Brains offers this possibility also with its IDE.
BSS works in a different way. And it's much cheaper.
I still don't get why so many people decide to buy BSS and their first message here is that they expect it to work in a different way or the devs implement some new function to fit their workflow.
Often people here buy (or get the free student version) BSS when it's not the right tool for their job.
I do not have a free version and I am not a student. If you are so averse to new ideas why do you create an "Ideas Channel" in this forum?
If BSS is only about adding or swapping margin or CSS classes, the browser offers them under "Developer Tools" and the ads or videos etc. seem to be very misleading.
@agund
The point @marrco is making, (which I also made in a different post the other day) is that almost every day we see new users come to the forums who've just purchased BSS, and before they've barely even used it, they start suggesting ideas to expand the program to be more similar to software they've used in the past, or to be more amenable to their particular "workflow," which generally involves niche applications/libraries/framesworks/etc... that have little to do with Bootstrap, and which few BSS users even use.
Bootstrap Studio does what it does incredibly well - which is enable people to rapidly build Bootstrap websites with clean, semantic code - because the developers remain specifically focused on continually improving the core program... Bootstrap, SASS, CSS, JS and HTML, not adding loads of other features, 3rd party libraries, frameworks, database integrations, back-end support, additional languages, plug-ins, utilities, etc. It keeps the cost of the program very affordable (since they're not having to license stuff from other companies,) or worry about updating BSS everytime another company updates their product. It also keeps the interface uncluttered, clean, and easy to learn.
When you realize what a great thing BSS has going on, you'll understand why most of us who've used the program for years are very hesitant to see any sort of major changes done based on input from people who've usually used the program less than a week, or barely built any websites with it. There's nothing wrong with new ideas. There have been dozens (hundreds) suggested in this forum that have made their way into BSS updates, but they general focus on ways of make the program itself better... UI improvements, ways to do things the program already does in more efficient fashions, etc. Also, we who post here are just users. We don't create the forums categories. That's up to the developers.
If you're into plug-ins and Bootstrap, you might want to take a look at Pinegrow. It supports Bootstrap, and they're constantly adding new third-party features, they encourage users to write plug-ins, and they're open to integrating new frameworks and adding more and more complexity (and cost) to the software. It's a very powerful program that I've slowly come to hate because it's become a bloated, buggy, nightmare. Wappler is another in the same vein.
Since I write many business applications, my customers don't care if I use Bootstrap, Tailwind or/and Material UI etc.
Thanks for the hints I will have a look at Pinegrow. Since my customers put more emphasis on background development, I want to spend less time on layout. Components that I have already created I want to be able to use again and again or to present a quick prototype I want to click components together quickly.
Maybe Pinegrow is the right place for me. I will have a look at it and change there if necessary.
One thing that hasn't really been discussed for you is that once you create something in BSS, you can save it as a Library item which can then be reused any time you like. This gives you a personal area of components that you can keep adding to yourself or even with downloaded ones from the Online Components area. Just thought I'd touch on that so you realized that this app can be helpful in that respect. You may not be able to import them easily, but you can save created components at any time very easily. That does give you a quik prototype setup as long as you don't expect to add a lot of backend items to it as you probably won't be able to visually see them.
The work around for a lot of that is to upload the items you want to add and use Absolute URL's to reference them until you get used to how it all works. When I first add a component that uses say Javascript, I upload the components and then I use the Absolute URL's so that I can see the items in the browser preview. Once I know it all works that way and all will show up correctly when exported, I can then change the Absolute URL's to Relative URL's and all will work fine on upload, I just can't see it while creating is all.
We all hope to see these types of things be updated in the app so they aren't so complicated to work around, but for now this works. Hope that helps some. :)
Yes, I have already seen that the components in BSS can be exported and imported. I have already used this. However, I have many already created components (currently separated in the JS, CSS and HTML folder) and to rebuild them all in BSS would be very tedious.
That I do not do any backend development in BSS is clear to me. I want to have it as a fast layout editor.
I see what you mean and unfortunately, there is no way to import HTML and still keep the drag and drop capabilities. If you do the HTML it will always be imported as Custom Code and you'll have to manually edit the code of all parts of it. Doesn't make BSS a good editor in any way for that, easier to load it up into a text editor at that point since all the benefits of using BSS would be lost on this part.