Framework vs Library
Posted by geetarista July 25, 2007
One of the great things that I love about web design is the community of individuals that come together to help one another and advance the industry. I have lately become more and more interested in frameworks and libraries since they make it a little easier to create sites and applications. However, I have been wondering what the differences are between the two and what these differences mean. I understand and believe in the concept of reusing code and see the many benefits that it has. Frameworks, libraries, classes, etc., are used to prevent programmers from reinventing the wheel so they can spend time on new and better things. With web development, there are many libraries and frameworks that are available for the very same reason. The only thing that I struggled with when I first learned of them was why there was a difference between them and what it meant.
From what I understand, a library is more lightweight and portable than a framework. A library usually contains many functions and classes that are used to assist a programmer with tools to reuse important code. A framework on the other hand is more robust and complicated. For example, a framework could include multiple libraries as well as pieces of software and other tools to assist the developer. So far I have only had a little experience with a couple of libraries, but I plan to keep learning about more frameworks and libraries so I can have more tools available in my arsenal.
