CSS was designed for providing view to the HTML and text that was displayed by the browser. Initially, CSS was developed only to provide styling to the fonts and text that was used to display the information. Later it evolved into many different types. The latest version of CSS is CSS 3 which takes care of the presentation logic that HTML pages use. CSS was designed to provide the presentation logic and to make sure that HTML pages are displayed in a variety of styles and fonts that were available back then. CSS stands for cascading style sheets and CSS is used to add visual appearance to any HTML page. Think of Web development as a human body, if HTML and JavaScript form the bones and guts of the body then CSS is the Clothes and Makeup that goes on the body. There are many changes done on CSS 3. This article describes the basic changes done to CSS in order to make it to the CSS 3 standards. We have listed down the basic CSS3 features that any UI/ UX programmer can use to enhance the visual appearance of Web pages.
Let us start with a basic introduction to CSS 3
What is CSS 3?
CSS 3 is an extension to CSS 2 and CSS 1 that defines how a particular element can be styled.
Let us analyze some CSS basics first. Within a website’s code, CSS works in coordination with HTML and JavaScript to bring forth the visual appearance that is both eye-pleasing and is elegant to view. For example, if a section within a webpage is marked
Basics of CSS:
First, let’s take a look at some of the CSS basics. CSS works alongside HTML in a website architecture to give it structure, style, and an elegant visual appearance. HTML is used to define what elements can appear on a web page, and CSS is used to define how those elements appear visually.
The Cascading aspect is the key here, storing the files as Cascading Style Sheets allows web developers to globally update these sheets for changes in design for multiple pages at once.
This is important because it reduces the complexity of having to update multiple sheets rather than updating a single sheet. You don’t have to change the font, color, and style for each and every sheet, changes to a single sheet of CSS would do the trick. CSS reduces this down to making changes in one externally linked layered file.
So let us see what features are new with CSS version 3
CSS 3 is the latest and newest standard for CSS under development from 2005. It is completely backward compatible with the older versions of CSS namely CSS 1 and CSS 2. CSS3 has new properties that have been set up for debugging previous quirks and extending CSS 2 features, and it has also got some JavaScript like built-in capabilities. CSS 3 also has addressed some concerns that were raised during web-page development for mobile devices. Such as Responsive Designing for mobile devices and it also addresses the incompatibility issues encountered for Adobe Flash elements for Mobile Devices. CSS has now incorporated into itself a lot of flash-now animations and has built-in features for adding interactivity into pages.
Here is a different features list that makes CSS3 superior to its predecessors:
1) Mobile First Preference:
CSS now supports responsive designing, it is well equipped to handle any and all types of media queries. Media queries are nothing but calls made by the website’s code to query which type of device, and the screen size the user is viewing the web-page on. This feature adds a whole new outlook and responsive design capability to the existing CSS feature list
2) Module based Coding:
One of the major features that have been incorporated into CSS is the module based coding feature. The CSS code is now split across modules. All the old CSS specification has now been merged with the new CSS version and is also divided into smaller more manageable pieces.
New modules are also added to it.
Here are some of the other CSS modules:
Selectors: Web Developers can now pinpoint elements or address elements by name, class, attribute, type, and more.
The Box Model Module: This module describes an approach to create consistency among the HTML elements on a given webpage. Each element is now addressed as boxes. We can now apply margins, border, padding, background, and more to these boxes. This enables web developers to clear an area around an element, and apply different styles to it.
Borders and Backgrounds: We now have better control over the treatment of page backgrounds and element borders. CSS3 now enables rounded corners on boxes and drop shadows. Before CSS3, Backgrounds could only be achieved by images and this caused the page file size to be increased, and had an increased effect on the load time of the webpage
Text Effects: CSS now includes text effects such as shadow effects, text overflow (This can hide text that can get too long for an element), word breaking ( automatically breaks the text so that the text can easily fit inside a box). And text wrapping all the thing that could save a lot of development time for Web Developers
3) Web Fonts give developers access to way more than just web safe fonts:
Before CSS3 web developers could only use web safe fonts to be 100% sure that the fonts would display the same on everyone’s machine. Web Safe fonts are the fonts that every single computer machine has installed and easily recognizes. If the web developer used common fonts such as Times New Roman or Arial, they would easily be able to guarantee that any user would view their website as it was intended to. However, if they wished to use a rarer font and it wasn’t supported by the user’s machine then the machine would default back to a web safe font.
Web Developers could now use web fonts in CSS3, these special fonts are available through Google Fonts and Typecast. These fonts can either be downloaded on a server and run through the CSS code or accessed directly via a source through a CSS script which is called right within the webpage code. This has opened a new world of possibilities for Web Developers.
4) CSS enables faster development and quicker load times:
CSS previously used to require background images, this has now been achieved through visual enhancements. Which saves development time in production. This saves time required to call and load background images because these features have been built into the code. Also, the page load speed is increased because of fewer calls to code and resources, as well as smaller file sizes.
5) We can now create 2D and 3D animations, as well as transitions and transformations:
These new effects allow elements on a webpage to rotate, flip grow or shrink and well as change into a different color. For the very first-time elements created in CSS can move on a screen which was otherwise able to be done through JavaScript or Flash code. Along with transitions, elements can now seamlessly change color or size. You can now set a time duration for the transition effect, for example, creating a button that changes color and slowly expands when you hover your mouse over it. This is the best CSS 3 feature of all.
Also Read: CSS3 vs CSS1: Find the Difference Between
6) New colors and image effects:
CSS 3 Now supports new colors (RGBA, HSL, and HSLA) as well as gradient colors for allowing adjustments to opacity. Another big feature is that it supports rounded edge corners. This is an effect that previously required a lot of formatting and Photoshop work to be achieved before.
7) Box-sizing has now fixed some annoying alignment problems:
Box-sizing now allows web designers to get the sizing of the elements right. This can be done without having to subtract the dimensions of the padding and borders. With the addition of the Box-Sizing property, the padding and borders are included in the height and width
CSS is a foundational web development technology that remains at the heart of how everything on the web looks visually. With the latest version, it is proving to be capable of so much more,
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8) Generated Content and Counters:
CSS3 features such as Generated Content and Counters allow developers to embed content into web pages without using HTML. With generated content, text, images, or other media can be added to a page, whereas with counters, you can keep track of things like how many items are in a list or how many times an element appears.
This capability is handy for developing dynamic web pages that can be readily updated without changing the HTML code manually.
9) Gradients:
CSS3 also includes gradients, which allow developers to transition between different colors on a web page smoothly. By using this feature, you can create a variety of visual effects, such as faded backgrounds or buttons that change color when they are hovered over. Gradients can be created using linear or radial patterns, and they can be applied using CSS to any HTML element.
10) Box Sizing:
As a CSS3 feature, Box Sizing allows web designers to control the size and positioning of elements. Using this feature, developers can specify the width, height, padding, and position of an element. They can also specify the top, right, bottom, and left properties of an element. Using this feature, you can easily create web pages that are responsive and adaptable to different screen sizes and resolutions.
11) Media Queries:
CSS3’s Media Queries feature allows developers to customize style elements based on screen size and resolution. Developers can use this feature to create styles that will only be applied based on specific devices, such as smartphones and tablets, when a web page is viewed on those devices. Web pages that appear great regardless of size or resolution can be created with this feature.
12) Border Radius:
Border Radius is a CSS3 feature that allows developers to build HTML components with rounded corners. This feature may be used to produce a variety of aesthetic effects, such as rounded-edged buttons or pictures with circular borders. Border radius may be utilised to give any web page a smooth and polished appearance.
Read More: CSS3 vs CSS2
Conclusion:
So now you know about the various features and objectives that CSS3 has to offer to web developers. We hope that you found this article useful. If so then do check out our other articles as well. If you are looking to hire web developers or UI UX designers then simply contact us with your requirements at enquiry@nimapinfotech.com with your requirements. We have the most talented and experienced developers ready to onboard your project in no time.
