I just want some honest opinions. I am about to finally rebuild this site (http://www.customdeckworks.com). I've been waiting until I built some smaller (and less important to me) sites and got more familiar with coffeecup software in general.

I just looked it up and found that Materialize is a Google platform. Well..... the entity we are (or me, anyway) trying to please the most is Google. It's also designed to have a minimal footprint. So those seems like good things. Good reasons to use it.
But also, Bob just unleashed a Theme that is FULL of Materialize Components - with the promise that more are coming fast. And I LOVE components!

For context:
I'm not a web guy or site builder. I'm a carpenter. But I learned "a lot" (lol) about coding by messing with the site above (that a friend built for me) over the years. And then I built another one - from scratch, hand-coded. But it's SO bulky and not even responsive!
I've done a couple of 'nothing' sites with SD3 and Grid Builder just trying to practice. I want to be able to start rebuilding that site above and move along & get it done!

So who votes I should use Materialize for this site? Why, why not?
Any help/advice is appreciated!

Hey Chris,

Here is my 2 cents (worth less, I'm sure). While the new component site is nice, nobody seems to be using the materialize platform (out of those showing sites made with SD3). I took a quick look through the "show us your site made with SD3"...most used Foundation...a couple had bootstrap and a couple used vanilla. So, if you think you might need someone with hands-on experience, it seems most use Foundation and are more familiar with it. Bootstrap seems to be a distant 2nd for whatever reason.

I lean toward Foundation mostly because I look at the forum a lot and find a lot of useful help and information. I wish they would have spent the same energy developing a bunch of components for Foundation as they did for Materialize. But...the Google point you made may be true...Google seems to be the go-to for almost anything...maybe the use of Materialize will be the standard?

With the new "matco" site, you are well on your way with a nice layout to follow...so there are pros and cons.

MJ

The reason I chose to do all of my sites with foundation is I really like there navigation. (sites that are made by bootstrap have a very generic navigation look).
I actually prefer the 3 breakpoints with foundation more than the many that come with bootstrap.
The foundation help on this forum has been nothing short of amazing for me too as only started May 2018.

From my opinion and I haven't really researched too much yet is that I chose foundation over materialize because there's really nothing I wanted to do that foundation and general css and css grid couldn't already do.

Regards Phil

Before I started using any of the responsive apps from CC, I had been using Bootstrap in the HTML Editor for a year or so, manually of course, and I liked it. Since Foundation came first from the hands of CC, I started using it about 2.5 years ago. And of course I also needed someone taking me by the hand at the beginning, so Foundation seemed a good choice.

What I'm saying here, kind of, is that I have a long 'career' of coding manually (Notepad to begin with in 1996), so I know what code it and how it works. That has helped me when I started on a more or less 'non-coding' career. And the help and advice I got from other users here also helped tremendously.

Since you are no 'web guy or site builder' you are likely to get stuck in between, as I was too, but I don't think you will find too many helpers here if you go for Materialize.

But if you are bold and adventurous, take a stab at it! I probably will too, but at my age learning new tricks takes longer than it did back in 1996, so maybe you will be the one offering me your help?

Hello,

I find this topic timely as I am relatively new to CoffeeCup Site Designer and hope to get more "involved". I took up site design as a hobby many years ago using Freeway Pro. I understood that program and was successful using it. Wanting to move to responsive design, I did my research and selected CoffeeCup as a replacement a couple of years ago. Feeling a little bit intimidated and with no pressing need to develop a site, I basically have been monitoring the forum trying to learn new concepts since then. When grid was introduced I was happy I hadn't invested much effort in learning rows and columns. I believe grid offers a great deal of potential, I like the concept.

Recently, one of my very few clients has requested an upgrade for her site, so it was time to get going. I had just started the design with Foundation, since it seemed to be the platform most members on this forum used. The site is very simple, I will not be using grid. However, when the the components for the Materialize framework were introduced this weekend my immediate reactions was great, I will use it instead. My thought process was that Site Designer works the same no matter the platform, it was the creation of the components that I might need help with. I know there are many kind posters who offer components, but thought a complete set that is immediately available would be simpler.

After reading responses to the original posters query, I am a little concerned about the types of help I might need. I kind of understand the each platform has built in classes that need to be understood to make certain features work well, hence the need to have access to experts or the friendly support from other forum users. But, if there is a suite of components, doesn't the need for that type of advice diminish if the site requirements are fairly basic? I believe the area where I will need more help is with the layout aspects of using Site Designer, which I believe is independent of the platform selected. Is this assumption wrong?

Sorry for being so long winded.

Vern

Sorry if my previous post was kind of scaring people away from Materialize. I didn't mean to do that, just wanted people to be aware.
But, if my hunch is right, now that the components and the theme for Materialize have been launched, there will be clever people sitting at their computer right this very moment, playing with this new toy, trying to find out all the 'secrets', so in one to two weeks, we will have some more Materialize-savvy folks around Just be a bit patient!

I do the odd website for clients and think I am sort of successful. Have started looooong ago with a HTML editor and discovered CoffeeCup when the editor I used disappeared off the market.

When SD3 incorporated Bootstrap, Foundation, Materialize and Vanilla, I tried them all. Did the same design on all 4 platforms and somehow Materialize won the toss. Maybe it is just my imagination, but I am more comfortable with it. I also make use of third party elements (Layerslider, Fancybox, and a Navbar I discovered on Codecanyon that I like) and everything works responsive and the way I want in Materialize.

Having Google involved adds a lot of positives, but in my mind it is also a big negative. From my experience, Google is very much "return on investment" driven and money normally come into play somewhere down the line. I hope I am wrong.

Then last weekend I got all excited with the arrival of the Components Library in my mailbox. There are two reasons why I will give it a pass.
1. Price (Google inspired?). Where I live, we do not pay in Dollars, and the conversion to local currency makes the product 14x more expensive. Makes you think twice, in particular if I consider point 2.
2. This is a quote on every page of the Component Collection: "There is some copyright thingy going here too. Feel free to do whatever you want with it after purchase [except resell without significant modification]" with no further explenation. Personally I read this to mean that I will not be allowed to use any of the components on websites that I develop for payment. (99% of the work I do) Unless, changing background colour is seen as "significant modification", which I doubt.

So for the time being, I am sold on Materialize (but without the Component Library).

Alright, let me briefly chime in here

Materialize is not Google. It is an independent CSS / JS framework inspired by the Material Design principle Google describes here:

https://material.io/design/

These design principles make a lot of sense from a user experience perspective and it is one of the reason Materialize is now higher on my list than Foundation (which was the solid #1 for several years).

On the license, you can literally do whatever you want, just not resell the theme or components without significant modification. Using the components in a website project is totally ok. The context will be different since it will be for a single client (or yourself) and design elements will be adjusted. The only thing not ok would be reselling the single components as is or reselling the theme with only minor changes. Maybe the best way to phrase this is: as long as you keep it decent and respectful all should be good

Hi everyone! Thanks for all the responses! They have been super helpful.
I think Bob's comment sums it all up for me. Based on who Bob is and the fact that he is saying Materialize may be his new fav, gives it big points for me.
Personally, I was aware of this (and therefore meant to say it this way): Materialize is a 'framework' based on a design principle that Google developed in 2014. And as we all know, Google loves nothing more than itself. And, while there are many standards Google must accept, anyone that does things based on or due to something Google came up with is bound to be favored. But even if not favored, if the framework is easier, better, more fun, more comprehensive, etc., etc., then it's still worth using.

To me, the points made about being able to get help in the CC forums is pretty important and I have noticed Foundation is the most used and therefore gets the most help.
Inger is always insightful and helpful to me! And as she said, there will be others using the Materialize framework and so help for it will become more common. Plus, the way I should look at it is: Since the site is for me, I have no deadline and no one is waiting on it, if I build it all the way out using Materialize and, for some strange reason, don't like it or it doesn't work somewhere (seriously doubtful), then that was some more good practice I needed anyway and I can just redo it in Foundation.

So I think I'm gonna go for it!

Inger & Bob: Thanks, as always! I'm sure we'll speak again as I go through this! lol

Mark Johnson: Your 2 cents is worth much more than that to me! Any help & feedback is ALWAYS appreciated!
Phil Dias: Thanks for your input too! I agree with everything you said! The components they have available for Materialize is making the grass look greener and so I must go check it out!

Vern Tarbutt: Never apologize to ME for being long winded. I'm the king of that! I have the same feeling you have.... that with components there will be less things you need help with. But for the things you do need, Bob will surely chime in as will any others that are figuring things out as we speak. I noticed it didn't get answered here, so if you need help with the layout aspects of SD3 then you might want to start a new topic so people that know can help. Phil did mention that Foundation has less breakpoints than Bootstrap (which I never noticed). And I know that is one thing that affects layout. So....

Faure: Thank you for your input! I'm glad to hear that Materialize won out when you tried them all with the same site. That's the exact kind of answer I was looking for! Also, to avoid confusion,
1) I'm pretty sure the price of the components has nothing to do with Google. I'm pretty sure Bob himself built these components. I, too, wish the price of the theme with the components would be lower but then I think about the time spent creating them. And if Bob did do these pretty much on his own then that money gets distributed throughout the CoffeeCup company whereever it needs to be reinvested. I see many people that work for CC and I don't see it advertised anywhere so I don't imagine they have tons of new customers per day. These people do work every day, for us, by creating & improving and being there for us in the forum and via support (free to us). So yeah, I wish the theme was half price of what it is. But I think about how much I'd want to charge if I spent the time to build it all. And I know we get more than our money's worth in constant help from these guys.
2) And I figured the "copyright thingy" was referring to anyone that wanted to go out there and sell individual themes or components. He has to say his disclaimer for the rare person that may be in that re-sell business. But most of us needn't worry over it since we actually build full websites - either for ourselves or our clients. The theme, as it appears before you customize it for your own web site, and the components are his Work Product and are protected. When we buy them we are paying for the right to change it and use it's basic layout/design as the "foundation" (if you will) for our website. But we do not have the right to make simple minor changes (change the background color, the menu button colors), rename it ThiefCo Theme and sell it as a theme to other people. Or sell the individual components. Anyway, I think most understand this. So yes, you WILL be able to use the theme and components on websites (as one of the many other parts) you build for your paying clients. But... if your website is called Theme & component store dot com and on the menu are stand alone themes & components Bob or CC created, then no.
I'm glad you like Materialize. I think I will too! And I think we will love the components as well!

See you all when I hit my first road block!
Thanks again!

Chris,

What a great response! Having been a Mediator (conflict resolution)for the last 9 years, I know how important affirmation can be. So thanks for addressing everyone in your own way. I, too, rely on help from these forums as I am not an IT guy or a "web guy" by default.

Good luck in your endeavors. I will see you on the forums!

MJ