
Bootstrap 4 Alpha 4 Released - rev
http://blog.getbootstrap.com/2016/09/05/bootstrap-4-alpha-4/
======
usaphp
I see a lot of people here and on GitHub project page complaining about
compatibility with older versions of bootstrap. I don't get it - if your
project is already working on older version of bootstrap - why even bother
updating it, I mean it's only CSS code, it's not like it will bring you any
speed improvements or something...I think it's neither bad or good thing that
new version of bootstrap less and less compatible with older versions, this
way at least we can get things like flexbox and drop support for older
browsers for our new projects, without sacrificing it just for a sake of
compatibility. From my experience it takes more time and issues from upgrading
cars library compared to just keep using the older version.

~~~
brianwawok
> I mean it's only CSS code, it's not like it will bring you any speed
> improvements or something

Most people who use bootstrap3 use the JavaScript also.

I suspect the worry is in 2 years (or however long they are bug fixing
bootstrap3), newer browsers will start to break on bootstrap3, and you will
have a complex way forward.

What bootstrap4 is doing is good, but it also can cause pain for users of
bootstrap3.

~~~
cloverich
> newer browsers will start to break on bootstrap3

Is that a common thing for browsers to break on older, previously compatible
CSS?

~~~
wongarsu
Are there any cases of browsers breaking on older web standards? The only
things I can think of that ever broke are plugins (Java, Flash) and vendor-
specific extensions (e.g. lots of IE quirks).

~~~
angry-hacker
<blink> element that was deprecated by browsers maybe. But that was non
standard to begin with.

Probably only things experimental, non spec are in danger, but it's safe to
think css is very future proof compared other languages designed for layouts.

------
baby
What's new? I haven't been following bootstrap 4, ( especially since I
switched to [http://semantic-ui.com/](http://semantic-ui.com/) ).

* I see a list of themes priced at 100$ :/ (maybe that's a good thing?)

* "Moved from Less to Sass". OK, that's a late addition but always welcomed. (Although there was already an unofficial sass version of bootstrap.)

* "Opt-in flexbox support is here". Why would flexbox not be opt-out?

* "giving you more opinionated resets like box-sizing: border-box". About fucking time.

~~~
eloisant
How is that a good thing (sass)? That means that instead of having a full JS
build now they need Ruby too...

~~~
Rafert
According to [http://blog.sass-lang.com/posts/809572-sass-35-release-
candi...](http://blog.sass-lang.com/posts/809572-sass-35-release-candidate)
the C++ based libsass is almost 100% compatible with Ruby Sass.

~~~
WorldMaker
Yes, but it's still a painful native dependency in the otherwise Node-based
build process. Native dependencies are getting better in Node, but still have
many painful edge cases.

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fideloper
Has bootstrap been this slow to roll out future versions before? Feels like
the main contributors are losing interesting/available time? (releases:
[https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/releases](https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/releases))

~~~
soupshield
I seen an issue on github[0] which mentions that a lot of development time is
still spent on version 3, which is slowing down progress on version 4. I
suppose future versions might take longer to roll out if they're supporting
the previous version at the same time.

0:
[https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/issues/20631](https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/issues/20631)

------
Scarbutt
What CSS framework is recommend these days if you can afford being flexbox
only?

~~~
sebslomski
What for do you need a framework? For buttons? For the grid? You most likely
have to adjust them anyways, so why not make a clean approach without the
bloat (in a sense of coding style [I'm very much into BEM]) of a framework?

~~~
Scarbutt
yeah, mostly for the design part and CSS quirks among browsers. I do want to
start with just sass and flexbox only though, but don't know how much hassle
it will be.

Thanks for mentioning BEM, do you use it with sass?

~~~
nailer
I use SASS mixins specifically instead of BEM: this keeps styling out of my
HTML (no visual classes to change) at the expense of a few bytes.

------
mixmastamyk
Beginning to wonder why they need to break compatibility so often?

~~~
ebbv
Because it's not meant for you to upgrade an existing front end from Bootstrap
3 to Bootstrap 4. It's meant for starting a new project on Bootstrap 4.

If you already have a working project on Bootstrap 3 why bother upgrading?

If they had to maintain backwards compatibility they wouldn't be able to make
a lot of the improvements they make.

~~~
niftich
Presumably because at some point Bootstrap 3 will stop getting bug fixes.
Historically, what has been their end-of-life policy?

~~~
niftich
So based on their github and some searching with google, historically they
didn't have much of an end-of-life policy, because there were _no_ bugfix
releases for v1.x.x after v2 came out, and no bugfix releases for v2.x.x after
v3 came out:

v3.0.0 - 2013-08-19

v3.0.0 RC1 - 2013-07-27

v2.3.2 - 2013-07-27

v2.3.1 - 2013-03-01

v2.0.0 - 2012-01-31

v1.4.0 - 2011-11-03

v1.3.0 - 2011-09-16

With major version 4 still being in alpha, there are concurrent releases of 3
going on still, but based on their previous releases, I don't expect a v3
bugfix release after 4.0.0.

~~~
yRetsyM
They mention in the original alpha release article this was a mistake. They
plan on supporting and bug fixing for the foreseeable future with bootstrap3

[http://blog.getbootstrap.com/2015/08/19/bootstrap-4-alpha/](http://blog.getbootstrap.com/2015/08/19/bootstrap-4-alpha/)

~~~
niftich
An update over the course of the previous 19 hours [1][2]; apparently that
foreseeable future ended 10 hours after you posted this excellent reminder.
They have begun closing [3] all outstanding github issues for v3 with the
text:

    
    
      Bootstrap 3 is no longer being officially developed
      or supported.
    
      All work has moved onto our next major release, v4.
      As such, this issue or pull request is being closed
      as a "won't fix." For additional help and support,
      we recommend utilizing our community resources.
      Thanks for your understanding, and see you on the
      other side of v4!
    
      <3,
      @mdo and team
    

[1]
[https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/issues/20631](https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/issues/20631)

[2]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12435425](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12435425)

[3]
[https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/issues/16913](https://github.com/twbs/bootstrap/issues/16913)

------
ausjke
It's said Bootstrap5 will possible use postcss, which is great.

Hope this can be released soon, I honestly feel tired waiting for Angular2 and
Bootstrap4 and I began to use something else instead(vuejs that is, stuck with
Bootstrap3)

~~~
flukus
Is that 3 releases in a row where they've changed their css compiler?

~~~
rspeer
It may be that changing the CSS compiler is the only change they make that's
big enough to warrant changing the major version number.

------
flukus
For anyone like me wondering what this flexbox stuff was all about:

[https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/a-guide-to-flexbox/](https://css-
tricks.com/snippets/css/a-guide-to-flexbox/)

Reminds me of swing and similar layout managers.

------
justrossthings
We've been using maximum of 1140px col-xl width since 1920x1080 was considered
the bleeding edge, but now monitors with 2560x1440 resolution are becoming
more common- _where 1140 barely covers half the width of the screen_.

Isn't about time we had a grid container that fixed this?

~~~
rangibaby
A page that wide doesn't sound very practical unless you want lots and lots of
columns. I was taught that an average 10 words per line is best for reading.

~~~
WorldMaker
Lots of columns can be great. Newspapers have been doing that for centuries.

~~~
rangibaby
I've been trying to reconcile print design principles with screen, and the
main difference is that on a screen you have unlimited vertical space. A
newspaper layout doesn't really make sense - do I go to the next column, or
scroll down? I think there are ways to guide the readers eye to where you want
it to go with color or in other ways, but it's an interesting design problem.

~~~
WorldMaker
I admit I'm one of the few that very much liked the Windows 8 design language
approach of readable columns scrolling off infinitely horizontally. I thought
that was a good design path. Screens don't have to scroll vertically.

------
aioprisan
Thoughts on when 4.0 stable will come out?

~~~
mtmail
There's 483 open issues with the label 'v4' to be addressed first. I see an
open issue for Alpha 5 and then there'll probably be release candidates so at
least a couple of months.

------
afarrell
Super excited for flexbox support.

------
CommanderData
Tested and looks like compatibility is broken with offsets , changes to btn
sizes, label margins and looks like custom style for select form elements has
changed or removed.

I think its best not to use this in any projects until its out of beta.

~~~
sotojuan
You mean out of alpha? Even more reason not to use it!

~~~
deecewan
Eh. I regularly use EcmaScript stage 0 proposals in smaller projects. If it's
not getting a heap of users, why not experiment?

~~~
sotojuan
Fair point, though I assume GP meant real products/work.

------
jiggly_piff
[http://v4-alpha.getbootstrap.com/getting-
started/flexbox/](http://v4-alpha.getbootstrap.com/getting-started/flexbox/)
praise jah

------
donmb
Good stuff but that blue CTA color is somehow causing eye cancer.

