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The Future of CSS Styling: How @scope is Revolutionizing Frontend Development
As frontend engineers, we’ve all struggled with CSS naming conventions. The popularity of the Block Element Modifier (BEM) method has provided a maintainable pattern for organizing styles, but the upcoming implementation of @scope in Chrome is set to take styling to the next level. By allowing block-level scoping of styles within a stylesheet, @scope promises to make styling easier to maintain and provide tighter control over the CSS cascade.
What is the CSS @scope?
In the upcoming Chrome 118 release, the @scope feature creates block-level scoping of CSS styles, giving developers more control over CSS styles. This means we can specifically define the scope for sections of a view directly in CSS files. For example, consider the following HTML:
Within this HTML, we can style the elements within the second-section styled area using @scope. This feature also allows for the creation of a “donut” scope, where the start and end sections are defined for a set of styles and the elements within them.
Browser Support for CSS @scope
As of October 2023, the CSS @scope feature is still experimental and requires the Experimental Web Platform features flag to be enabled in Chrome. To do this, simply open a tab in Chrome, go to chrome://flags/, and search for the Experimental Web Platform features flag.
What is BEM?
The Block Element Modifier (BEM) method is a way to group styles within an HTML view that can be easily navigated. It structures style names around what is actually being styled, using a block, element, and modifier approach. For example, consider the following HTML:
In this HTML, the sample-page style is the block, the <h1> element is an element, and the <p> element within the <section> element has an additional modifier.
Refactoring BEM to use @scope
One of the biggest advantages of using @scope is that it can replace BEM styling, making style definitions smaller and more manageable. To demonstrate this, let’s take a look at a sample application on GitHub that has a page styled first with BEM and then refactored using @scope.
Starting with the BEM-styled component, we can see how the refactor to @scope simplifies the style definitions. For example, in the original BEM version, there were different styles defined for each section. In the @scope version, there is a more succinct style definition for the specific elements.
Additional Benefits of @scope vs. BEM
In addition to the advantages of refactoring BEM into @scope, the use of @scope also allows for better control of the CSS cascade. The CSS cascade is an algorithm that defines how web browsers handle styling conditions from elements on a composed HTML page. Using @scope, one can potentially control the side effects of the cascade by tightly scoping the elements.
To illustrate this, let’s take a look at an example of a page impacted by the cascade. Without @scope, the CSS cascade would evaluate selectors and styles based on specificity and order of appearance. With @scope, the CSS cascade takes the @scope elements into account first, allowing for more precise control over the styling.
The Future of Frontend Development
In conclusion, the new @scope feature coming to Chrome has the potential to revolutionize frontend development. By providing a more maintainable and scalable way to style frontend projects, @scope could be a game-changer for developers. While it may take time for other browsers to implement support, it’s definitely an interesting feature worth exploring.