Write optimized CSS in Symfony with Stylify

Stay in Twig and PHP files, write HTML and get optimized CSS. From anoying switching between files to flawless coding. Learn how to improve the coding experience in your Symfony Web Application in 5 minutes 🚀.

Introduction

Stylify generates CSS dynamically based on what you write. The syntax is similar to css property:value. Defined utilities are combined with components selectors and in production minified to bare minimum like .color\:red,.button {color:red} to _zx, _ga{color:red}.

With Stylify, you can stay in the Twig templates or PHP files, write selectors and get smallest CSS chunks possible for each page separately 🤟.

Symfony Quick Setup 🚀

The easiest way to start is to use the Symfony Skeleton and Webapp packages.

composer create-project symfony/skeleton myproject/
cd myproject
composer require webapp
npm install

Add the HpController src/Controller/HpController.php

<?php

namespace App\Controller;

use Symfony\Bundle\FrameworkBundle\Controller\AbstractController;
use Symfony\Component\Routing\Annotation\Route;
use Symfony\Component\HttpFoundation\Response;

class HomeController extends AbstractController
{
    #[Route('/')]
    public function home(): Response
    {
        return $this->render('hp.html.twig');
    }
}

and the homepage template templates/hp.html.twig.

{% extends "base.html.twig" %}
{% block body %} Hello World! {% endblock %}

Stylify Integration

Install Stylify universal plugin.

npm i @stylify/unplugin

Update the webpack.config.js. Import Stylify, add plugin and the hp style entry.

const { webpackPlugin } = require('@stylify/unplugin');
const path = require('path');
// ...
const layoutCssPath = './assets/styles/layout.css';
const homepageCssPath = './assets/styles/homepage.css';

Encore
  .addPlugin(webpackPlugin({
    transformIncludeFilter: (id) => id.endsWith('twig') || id.endsWith('.php'),
    bundles: [
        { outputFile: layoutCssPath, files: [
            './templates/base.html.twig'
        ]},
        { outputFile: homepageCssPath, files: [
            './templates/hp.html.twig'
        ]}
    ]
  }))
  .addStyleEntry('homepage', homepageCssPath)
  // ...

Change app.css in assets/app.js to 'layout.css' and add the css link into the hp.html.twig.

{% block stylesheets %}
  {{ parent() }}
  {{ encore_entry_link_tags('hp') }}
{% endblock %}

Styling the website

When the setup is finished edit the hp.html.twig

<div class="color:blue">Hello world!</div>

and run npm run dev.

Stylify will find the color:blue selector, and generate the css for it. .color\:blue{color:blue} into the homepage.css.

Some code often needs to be reused accross multiple pages. It's not a good idea to have bloated templates by utilities and hardcoded units in the selectors. Let's define a container component and some variables.

Open the webpack.config.js and edit the Stylify plugin config:

.addPlugin(webpackPlugin({
  // ...
  extend: {
    bundler: {
      compiler: {
        variables: {
          containerSize: '800px',
          textColor: 'blue'
        },
        components: {
          container: 'max-width:$containerSize margin:0__auto'
        }
      }
    }
  }
}))

Now we can update the base.html.twig

<div class="container">{% block body %}{% endblock %}</div>

and the hp.html.twig

<div class="color:$textColor">Hello world!</div>

Sometime, some components are used only one place. It doesn't make sense to define them in the webpack.config.js. We can also define components, variables and etc directly in the file where they are used. Stylify has a content options for that.

Let's add a paragraph component in the hp.html.twig:

{#
@stylify-components
  'text-block': `
    font-size:16px
    margin:12px__0
    md:margin:24px__0
  `
/@stylify-components
#}
...
{% block body %}
    ...
    <div class="text-block">First text</div>
    <div class="text-block">Second text</div>
{% endblock %}

The production build

When we run the build for production npm run build, Stylify automatically mangles all recognized selectors and generates optimized CSS.

Optimized hp.html.twig:

{% block body %}
    <div class="_ghd5j">Hello World!</div>
    <div class="_hhvd">First text</div>
    <div class="_hhvd">Second text</div>
{% endblock %}

Optimized hp css:

._ghd5j{color:blue}
._h0jma,
._hhvd{font-size:16px}
._gbu5r,._hhvd{margin:12px 0}
@media (min-width: 768px) {._bpb5,._hhvd{margin:24px 0}}

The example can be also found on stylifycss.com website.

Configure anything you need

The examples above doesn't include everything Stylify can do:

• You can map nested files in the template
• Style global selectors
• Define custom screens
• Add own macros like ml:20px for margin-left
• And a lot more

Feel free to checkout the docs to learn more 💎.

Let me know what you think!

If you like the idea, let me know that by starring Stylify repo ❤️.

I will also be happy for any feedback! The Stylify is still a new Library and there is a lot of space for improvement 🙂.

Stay in touch:
👉 @8machy
👉 @stylifycss
👉 stylifycss.com
👉 dev.to/machy8
👉 medium.com/@8machy