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Compass vs Sass vs Stylus: What are the differences?
File Extension Handling: Compass is an extension of Sass, offering additional features like mix-ins and functions whereas Sass is a preprocessor scripting language that will be compiled into CSS. Stylus, on the other hand, uses an indentation-based syntax instead of braces which makes the code cleaner and more concise.
Syntax Differences: Compass provides mixins, functions, and other features that make writing styles easier and quicker. Sass follows strict indentation rules to define nesting while Stylus allows optional braces and semicolons to make code more readable and concise.
Community and Adoption: Compass has a larger community and ecosystem with a lot of resources and third-party plugins available. Sass has been widely adopted by developers due to its powerful features and CSS-like syntax. Stylus has a smaller community but is known for its flexibility and customizable nature.
Ease of Learning Curve: Compass, being an extension of Sass, might have a steeper learning curve for beginners due to its additional features. Sass, while powerful, has a straightforward syntax and is easier to grasp. Stylus, with its minimalistic approach, has a shorter learning curve and is preferred by developers looking for a simpler language.
Performance and Compilation: Compass, being built on top of Sass, might have a slightly longer compilation time due to the additional features it offers. Sass has efficient compilation processes and can generate clean, optimized CSS output. Stylus is known for its fast compilation speed and lightweight syntax, making it a preferred choice for projects where performance is crucial.
Flexibility and Extensibility: Compass offers a wide range of ready-to-use mixins and functions, making it easy to extend and customize stylesheets. Sass allows for the creation of custom functions and mixins, providing flexibility in writing and managing styles. Stylus, with its open architecture, allows developers to easily create plugins and extend its functionality.
In Summary, differences between Compass, Sass, and Stylus lie in file extension handling, syntax, community adoption, learning curve, performance, and flexibility of customization.
Originally, I was going to start using Sass with Parcel, but then I learned about Stylus, which looked interesting because it can get the property values of something directly instead of through variables, and PostCSS, which looked interesting because you can customize your Pre/Post-processing. Which tool would you recommend?
We know that Sass is not a replace for CSS, but in my mind there is no CSS with no Sass.
One of the first complement/plugins I add to the environment, are the Sass processing files/demons.
I couldn't imagine going back to pure CSS. Sass is even the way to go, regarding Styled Components, CSS Modules, and all the other options.
JSS is makes a lot of sense when styling React components and styled-components is a really nice implementation of JSS. I still get to write pure CSS, but in a more componentized way. With CSS post-processors like SASS and LESS, you spend a lot of time deciding where your .scss or .less files belong, which classes should be shared, and generally fighting the component nature of React. With styled-components, you get the best of CSS and React. In this project, I have ZERO CSS files or global CSS classes and I leverage mixins quite a bit.
Pros of Compass
- No vendor prefix CSS pain9
- Mixins1
- Variables1
- Compass sprites1
Pros of Sass
- Variables613
- Mixins594
- Nested rules466
- Maintainable410
- Functions300
- Modular flexible code149
- Open source143
- Selector inheritance112
- Dynamic107
- Better than cs96
- Used by Bootstrap5
- If and for function3
- Better than less2
- Inheritance (@extend)1
- Custom functions1
Pros of Stylus
- Simple69
- Indented syntax54
- Efficient38
- Built for node.js33
- Open source32
- Expressive24
- Maintainable21
- Feature-rich17
- Better than CS13
- Variables6
- Functions5
- @extend directive3
- Contempt for curly brackets2
- Very clean2
- Mixins2
- Is Easy2
- No colons, semi-colons or even curly braces2
- Its unique1
- Dynamic selectors1
- Scriptable1
- Easy Efficiently1
- Transparent1
- Supports orthogonal architecture1
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Cons of Compass
Cons of Sass
- Needs to be compiled6
Cons of Stylus
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