my-css-flex

The CSS flex classnames every project needs.

Install

npm install my-css-flex

<link rel="stylesheet" href="/node_modules/my-css-flex/flex.min.css" />

or a CDN Link:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/taitulism/css-flex@latest/flex.min.css" />

Classnames

Reference Images: Rows | Columns

Row Classnames:

Main axis (x)

• .flexrow
• .flexrow-start (alias: .flexrow)
• .flexrow-center (alias: .flex-center)
• .flexrow-end
• .flexrow-spread

Secondary axis (y)

• .f-top
• .f-bottom
• .f-stretch

Column Classnames:

Main axis (y)

• .flexcol
• .flexcol-start (alias: .flexcol)
• .flexcol-center
• .flexcol-end
• .flexcol-spread

Secondary axis (x)

• .f-left
• .f-right
• .f-stretch

Flex item

• .flex-item

 

A few words

TL;DR

With my-css-flex - flex containers are centered on the secondary axis by default because it makes more sense IMHO.

Read More...

Flex containers have a main axis and a secondary axis. The main axis is the one that matches the container direction (`x` for rows, `y` for columns). The secondary axis is, of course, the other one.

To align items inside a flex container on its main axis we use the justify-content CSS property and for the secondary axis we use align-items.

Naturally, flex items will be placed at the top-left corner, for both rows and columns. This is because the default value for both axes is flex-start.

While it makes sense for the main axis, it makes less sense for the secondary axis.

When we close our eyes and imagine a navigation bar (or any other row of buttons) we would probably picture it centered on the y axis with equal space at the top and at the bottom.

With my-css-flex - package flex containers are centered on the secondary axis by default.

 

---

Flex Direction

There are two main classnames, one for rows and one for columns:

• .flexrow
• .flexcol

 

Main Axis

To place the items along the main axis use flexrow | flexcol with, optionally, one of the following suffixes:

-start | -center | -end | -spread

• -start is the default for the main axis and can be omitted:
  .flexrow and .flexrow-start are the same.
  .flexcol and .flexcol-start are the same.

 

.flexrow

┌──────────────────┐
│ ┌──┐┌──┐         │
│ └──┘└──┘         │
└──────────────────┘

VISUAL BUG: For some reason this looks weird on npm website. Continue on GitHub...  

.flexrow-center

┌──────────────────┐
│     ┌──┐┌──┐     │
│     └──┘└──┘     │
└──────────────────┘

 

.flexrow-end

┌──────────────────┐
│         ┌──┐┌──┐ │
│         └──┘└──┘ │
└──────────────────┘

 

.flexrow-spread (A.K.A "space-between")

┌──────────────────┐
│ ┌──┐        ┌──┐ │
│ └──┘        └──┘ │
└──────────────────┘

To see the flexcol equivalents, please tilt your head to the left :)

 

Secondary Axis

To align items along the secondary axis we add a secodary classname.

Secondary classnames start with an f- prefix and should be used together with a main axis classname.

For rows:

• .f-top
• .f-bottom

For columns:

• .f-left
• .f-right

For both, rows and columns:

• .f-stretch

 

The "f-" prefix is used to reduce the chance of classname collisions.

 

Examples:

.flexrow-center.f-top

┌─────────────────────┐
│      ┌──┐ ┌──┐      │
│      └──┘ └──┘      │
│                     │
│                     │
└─────────────────────┘

 

.flexrow-center.f-stretch

┌─────────────────────┐
│      ┌──┐ ┌──┐      │
│      │  │ │  │      │
│      │  │ │  │      │
│      └──┘ └──┘      │
└─────────────────────┘

 

.flexcol-spread.f-right

┌────────────┐
│       ┌──┐ │
│       └──┘ │
│            │
│            │
│       ┌──┐ │
│       └──┘ │
└────────────┘

 

Centering

To center a single item inside a container use (on the container):

• .flex-center

┌─────────────┐
│             │
│     ┌─┐     │
│     └─┘     │
│             │
└─────────────┘

For multiple items use one of:

• .flexrow-center
• .flexcol-center

.flexrow-center            .flexcol-center
┌──────────────┐             ┌───────────┐
│              │             │           │
│              │             │    ┌─┐    │
│    ┌─┐┌─┐    │             │    └─┘    │
│    └─┘└─┘    │             │    ┌─┐    │
│              │             │    └─┘    │
│              │             │           │
└──────────────┘             └───────────┘

In any case, don't use a secondary axis classname.

 

Flex item

.flex-item

Sets a flex item with flex: 1 1 auto;

Common usages:

1. When all the items in a flex container have the same size and expected to grow/shrink similarly.

   ┌────────────────┐    ┌────────────────────────┐
   │┌──┐┌──┐┌──┐┌──┐│ ←→ │┌────┐┌────┐┌────┐┌────┐│
   │└──┘└──┘└──┘└──┘│    │└────┘└────┘└────┘└────┘│
   └────────────────┘    └────────────────────────┘
   

2. When you need one item in a flex container to be stretchy/greedy and take all the space it could get while the rest of its siblings have static sizes.

   ┌──────────────────────────┐
   │┌──┐┌──┐┌──┐┌────────┐┌──┐│
   │└──┘└──┘└──┘└────────┘└──┘│
   └──────────────────────────┘
   

 

 

Reference Images

Rows

Columns

 

Development

Open the playground HTML file in the browser

./playground/index.html

To work with the minified file, run:

npm run dev

and swap CSS references in the playground HTML

Publish

Currently there are no tests.

Before publish run the HTML playground to verify everything visually.

Todo: Tests