twitter-bootstrap vs jquery-mobile [closed]

Question

I'm wondering if someone can give some advice as to which is 'better'. Twitter-bootstrap or JQuery mobile?

Thanks, -peter

Answer 1

I don't know if "better" is something you can answer since they serve different purposes. Bootstrap is great all-purpose CSS library whereas jQueryMobile is closer to a framework. Meaning jQueryMobile doesn't just make your pages look nice- it gives a lot of mobile oriented features such as- swipe-events, page transitions, allows for single page applications (since it will only show a single div with data-role='page' at a time), AJAX preload and history API, and lots of touch friendly components/widgets. Whereas bootstrap is foremost a CSS library mostly for desktop but works on mobile as well especially since 2.0 comes with media queries built in. Bootstrap will not help you with touch friendly lists, checkboxes, select menu's, etc.

One more thing to point out, jQueryMobile takes your markup and dresses it with all sorts of pretty stuff using JavaScript. Bootstrap has some javascript, but only for optional components, the rest is CSS.

So to answer IMHO- if you're a making a web application that you explicitly plan on using primarily on mobile devices go with jQueryMobile; Anything else go with Bootstrap- it's really quite awesome.

Answer 2

jQuery mobile != twitter bootstrap. Twitter bootstrap is used to create responsive layouts [a single CSS can work on big as well as small screen size]. jQuery mobile is intended for mobile development. So if you develop a site using jQuery mobile won't give a good layout consistency in all desktop browsers.