Getting Started with SASS

2 min readSep 11, 2015

Sass is a CSS preprocessor that adds power and elegance to the basic language. It allows you to use variables, nested rules, mixins, inline imports, and more, all with a fully CSS-compatible syntax.

Sass helps keep large stylesheets well organised, and get small stylesheets up and running quickly, particularly with the help of the Compass style library. Here you will find all you need to start with Sass.

Installation

Before start using Sass you need to install Ruby (is already install in OSX).

Open the terminal.

2. Check if Ruby is installed

$ ruby -v

3. Install Sass

$ gem install sass

4. Check if Sass is installed

$ sass -v

Variables

$font-stack: Helvetica, sans-serif
$primary-color: #3d3d3d$font-stacl: Helvetica, sans-serif
$primary-color: #3d3d3dbody
  font: $font-stack
  color: $primary-color

Nesting

Sass uses nested and visual hierarchy.

nav
  ul
    margin: 0
    padding: 0
    list-style: none  li
    display: inline-block  a
    display: block
    padding: 6px 12px
    text-decoration: none

Partials

Files that contain little snippets of CSS that you can include in other Sass files (a way tod do modularization). Partials can be use with the @import clause.

@import partials/reset

Mixins

Make groups of CSS declarations that you can reuse throughout your site.

=border-radius($radius)
  -webkit-border-radius: $radius
  -moz-border-radius:    $radius
  -ms-border-radius:     $radius
  border-radius:         $radius.box
  +border-radius(10px)

Extend / Inheritance

Lets you share a set of CSS properties from one selector to another

.message
  border: 1px solid #ccc
  padding: 10px
  color: #333.success
  @extend .message
  border-color: green.error
  @extend .message
  border-color: red.warning
  @extend .message
  border-color: yellow

Operators

Standard math operators to make calculations.

.container
  width: 100%article[role="main"]
  float: left
  width: 600px / 960px * 100%aside[role="complimentary"]
  float: right
  width: 300px / 960px * 100%

Processing

Open the terminal and locate your files
Generate CSS file:

$ sass main.sass main.css

That’s is all you need to start learning Sass. Now you can begin to write CSS as ninja style.

More info, examples and demos here.