What is a framework?

The answer will vary depending on who you ask. No doubt some are for frameworks and some against. Frameworks, as with everything, have their place and when used right they are a very valuable tool.

This post highlights our interpretation of frameworks, setting the stage for more information about Morph in future posts.

What does the word framework mean to you?

What comes to mind when you think of the word framework – just the word itself, outside of the context of any system?

Perhaps it’s easier if you first look at some common synonyms, to help you paint a better picture: plan, base, shell, frame, scheme, skeleton, structure, blueprint and groundwork.

All of the synonyms above represent some kind of starting point, head start or foundation upon which to continue building in order to complete what is needed. You may also get the feeling that most of the words indicate that a lot of the work is already complete, especially the important groundwork.

What is a framework according to others?

Now that we have looked at the broader idea of a framework, its time for something a little closer to home. Frameworks have attracted, especially of late, a lot of attention in the CMS community and is the cause of many debates about its viability, purpose and execution.

To set the platform of what a framework is, lets take a look at my favorite article about frameworks – Frameworks for designers written by Jeff Croft on alistapart. In his article Jeff explains it very well, and I could not say it any better, so it’s best in his words:

“So that we’re all on the same page, let’s agree—at least for the duration of this article—on this definition of “framework”: a set of tools, libraries, conventions, and best practices that attempt to abstract routine tasks into generic modules that can be reused.

The goal here is to allow the designer or developer to focus on tasks that are unique to a given project, rather than reinventing the wheel each time around. Generally speaking, this is the approach taken by the aforementioned JavaScript and web application frameworks.”

Brilliant!! Can you see the parallels with his definition to the ideas you previously conjured up about a framework? If all the hard work is done and wrapped up into re usable tools and conventions, then we as developers can get down and dirty with what matters in the project. If you have ever used jquery, mootools or any other javascript library, you are easily able to relate to the intense value frameworks offer us developers.

Why we chose to build the Morph framework

The next post in this series will be titled Why we chose to build a framework so to end off what’s been mentioned above, let me give you our interpretation of a framework and why it was such a fitting concept to apply to our existing business model.

The most important benefit a framework offers to its users, in my opinion, is allowing them to build much faster what they would have built from scratch by providing a set of pre built features, enhancements and tools that can be used commonly across all projects. This will eliminate a massive amount of the work from each project, thereby vastly improving delivery times… because the focus is on what’s unique to the project, not what’s common across all of them.

It is in this light that we have built Morph, a template providing its users with a way of setting up their website exactly how they need it. You are able to focus on the content and tap into the tools within Morph’s core, this making it easy to achieve simple and complex tasks – and at the end of the day rapidly build more feature rich web sites.

…on a final note

As we said before, frameworks are the cause of many debates about its viability, purpose and execution – maybe especially in the CMS industry and most of all Joomla and Wordpress by the looks of it. If you have any opinions, fears or cheers – please give us your onions or orchids in the comments below and we’ll respond to every single one of them.

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Tags: framework, Morph