What is a framework?
Jeff Croft, Senior Designer of World Online (publishers of Lawrence Journal-World), in an article titled "Frameworks for Designers," explains:
"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...
"Chances are, you can benefit from a similar abstraction of CSS code for your web design process. Those who can benefit most are designers who work on several sites of a similar nature. Additionally, designers working on a team with other designers have a lot to gain from a framework approach."
Yahoo's YUI grid component is a css framework that provides more than 1000 page layout combinations. Ours doesn't need to be quite so complicated, though it does allow for significant flexibiliy in page layout.
Includes network head, site head, site foot and network foot as well as standard scripts and stylesheets. For use in any site set up with the '08 framework.