Maintaining dual sets of files for website design projects

When working on website design and programming projects, I often wonder if it is common practice for experienced developers to maintain two sets of files - one for development and another for production like in jQuery.

For instance, I have a project where the Markup & CSS are heavily commented by me. The code is meticulously indented, spaced, and tabbed. Here's an example:

Markup

<!-- START google translate script link ================================================================== -->
<meta name="google-translate-customization" content="9f841e7780177523-3214ceb76f765f38-gc38c6fe6f9d06436-c"></meta>
<!-- END google translate script link ==================================================================== -->

<!-- START stylesheet link =============================================================================== -->
<link href="styles/main.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" media="all" />
<!-- END stylesheet link ================================================================================= -->

<div id="header_text"><!-- START header_text ============================================================= -->
<h1 id="first-child">Pak United Food Services Ltd.,</h1>
<h1 id="last-child"><a href="http://www.pufs.org/" title="www.pufs.org">PUFS</a></h1>
<span></span>
</div><!-- END header_text =============================================================================== -->

CSS

/* START import ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- */
@import url("reset.css");
@import url("feature-carousel.css");
/* END import --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- */

/* START wrapper ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ */
div#wrapper
{
width: 100%;
font-family: Calibri, Arial, Georgia,Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;
font-size: 16px;
line-height: 22px;
background: url("../images/bg.jpg") repeat scroll 0 0 #1D2426;
}
/* END wrapper -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- */

Should we maintain two sets of files? One for development with all the comments, spaces, indents, tabs, and line breaks intact, and another trimmed down version for deployment? It might make the code less readable but more optimized for production.

Answer №1

Holding two separate sets of files is a major risk as errors are bound to occur, leading to inconsistencies between the two versions.

Instead of managing multiple file versions, consider implementing a deployment process. This process can involve creating a copy of the files and executing a script to clean up any unnecessary spaces before deploying them.

Answer №2

Absolutely!

When it comes to optimizing website performance, a build script is key. Many opt for either creating their own custom script or utilizing tools like

In my personal workflow, I incorporate the following steps:

  • Utilizing a script to concatenate and minify javascript files using uglify.js
  • Implementing SASS to ensure CSS is clean and minified
  • Using optimization tools like jpegtrans, optipng, pngcrush to reduce image sizes
  • Leveraging a PHP output filter to cache and further compress PHP files

By following this approach, I can design websites freely while guaranteeing users only encounter 1 CSS file, 1 JS file, optimized HTML, and small images.

Similar questions

If you have not found the answer to your question or you are interested in this topic, then look at other similar questions below or use the search

PHP Checkbox Form encountering Implode Errors

I'm a newcomer here and I did my best to search through the previous posts before reaching out, but unfortunately I couldn't find a solution that addressed my specific issue with my form. I'm still in the learning process, so I'm not en ...

The function document.getElementById().value is malfunctioning

I've been working on a project focused on employee data stored in a MySQL database. To display this data in an HTML table, I utilized PHP. $sql = "SELECT * FROM Stock_Management.`staff_details`"; $result = mysqli_query($conn, $sql); if(mysq ...

ETags for webpages generated on the server-side and equipped with a CSP nonce

I have successfully implemented ETags in my server-side-rendered React app using Node/Express, allowing for client-side caching. The HTML is generated with inlined fragments of render-blocking CSS and JS for faster first renders according to Google's ...

ReactJS allows the display of placeholder text for input fields only when they are actively selected

After modifying the BootstrapInput code snippet to the following: <BootstrapInput id="age-customized-input" placeholder="Search Title" /> I noticed that the placeholder text only appears when the input field is activated. Does anyone kno ...

"Want to know the best way to retrieve the most recent form input value using jQuery or Javascript

I've been reading a lot about using jQuery to set and get field values, but I'm encountering an issue where I can't retrieve the value after submitting, editing it in an input field, and then submitting again. It works the first time, but no ...

Leveraging BeautifulSoup for extracting information from HTML documents

I'm working on a project to calculate the distance between Voyager 1 and Earth. NASA has detailed information available on their website at this link: ... I've been struggling to access the data within the specified div element. Here's the c ...

Enhance the aesthetics of placeholder text in Semantic UI React using CSS styling

Currently, I am utilizing Semantic UI dropdowns within my React application to generate drop-down menus similar to the ones showcased in their documentation found here: The initial text displayed is "Select Friend", and it appears with a semi-transparent ...

What is the best way to make an HTML form show fields depending on certain conditions?

Initially, I created an index page containing a form with various fields. The utility was built to handle all the fields, but now there's been a change in requirements. What I need is for only the Controller Type and Test Type fields to be displayed f ...

Having issues with my project as the Three.js Scene is malfunctioning and the THREE object is not

My attempt at creating my first three.js project has hit a roadblock. After following a tutorial, I expected to see a black scene upon loading the page, but all I'm getting is a white screen. Errors in Chrome Browser Console: three.js:1 Failed to lo ...

Error retrieving resource: server returned a 404 status code indicating file not found for javaScript and CSS files

I can't seem to get my css and js files to load on the server. Here is how my file structure looks like: GAME_Folder https://i.sstatic.net/wzfB3.png HTML doctype html head link(href='https://fonts.googleapis.com/css2?family=Press+Start+2P& ...

Text alongside a perfectly aligned image

I'm facing a dilemma. I've been striving to replicate the layout of my training website blocks to look like this: http://prntscr.com/4cd4gm. However, aligning text and paragraphs has become an obstacle for me. Despite succeeding in aligning pictu ...

Form Field Highlighting

I am currently attempting to eliminate the blue "halo" outline that appears on form elements in Firefox on OS X. I have successfully removed the halo in Safari on OS X using CSS with the following code: input { outline: none; } However, this method doe ...

Arrange a div element among the descendants of a neighboring div

I am working with a div that is generated by a library. This div contains 2 child divs with varying heights, which can change based on the API response and the width of the browser window. My goal is to display another div (my-div) between top-bar and bot ...

The aesthetic of react-bootstrap and material ui aesthetics is distinctive and visually appealing

As I develop my web application, I have incorporated react-bootstrap for its React components based on Bootstrap. However, wanting to give my project a customized look inspired by Material design, I came across bootstrap-material-design. I am curious if I ...

Using Angular 2 to assign unique ids to checkbox values

Is there a way to retrieve the value of a checkbox in Angular 2 without needing an additional Boolean variable? I am trying to toggle the enabled/disabled state of an input field based on the selection of a checkbox. While I know this can be accomplished ...

Use of image tag inside the title attribute

After coming across the question on how to add an image tag inside the title attribute of an anchor tag and finding only one answer claiming it's impossible, I stumbled upon a page where it was actually done: I decided to view the source of the page ...

Arranging two stretchable div elements side by side

I'm currently working on a web page layout where I want two divs to be flexible and adjust their size as the browser window is resized. However, I've encountered an issue where instead of shrinking, the line breaks between the two divs when the w ...

Creating a user-friendly HTML form to convert multiple objects into JSON format

Edited content: $.fn.serializeObject = function() { var obj = {}; var arr = this.serializeArray(); $.each(arr, function() { var value = this.value || ''; if (/^\d+$/.test(value)) value = +value; if (obj[this.name] !== u ...

Utilize jQuery to animate the hiding of my right sidebar

Looking for help with implementing a jQuery animation to hide the right sidebar on my 3-columns page. I created a demo online here - JsFiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/yhfXX/ In my template, the columns are arranged as follows: menu (on the left) is fixed co ...

What is the best way to transfer data to a different section of my HTML webpage using PHP?

Can data be passed from an array to another part of the html code that is not in the same file? In file item.php and index.php, there is an array with objects. The goal is to include item.php as many times as the count of items in the array and send diffe ...