Skip to content

Instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

@jasny
Last active January 5, 2020 15:36
Show Gist options
  • Save jasny/9731895 to your computer and use it in GitHub Desktop.
Save jasny/9731895 to your computer and use it in GitHub Desktop.
Use em or rem font-size in Bootstrap 3
/**
* Use em or rem font-size in Bootstrap 3
*/
@font-size-root: 14px;
@font-unit: 0rem; // Pick em or rem here
// Convert all variables to em
@font-size-base: 1 + @font-unit;
@font-size-large: 1.25 + @font-unit;
@font-size-small: 0.85 + @font-unit;
@font-size-h1: 2.6 + @font-unit;
@font-size-h2: 2.15 + @font-unit;
@font-size-h3: 1.7 + @font-unit;
@font-size-h4: 1.25 + @font-unit;
@font-size-h5: @font-size-base;
@font-size-h6: 0.85 + @font-unit;
@line-height-computed: (@font-size-base * @line-height-base);
@padding-base-vertical: ((6px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-base-horizontal: ((12px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-large-vertical: ((10px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-large-horizontal: ((16px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-small-vertical: ((5px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-small-horizontal: ((10px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-xs-vertical: ((1px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@padding-xs-horizontal: ((5px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@border-radius-base: ((4px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@border-radius-large: ((6px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@border-radius-small: ((3px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@caret-width-base: ((4px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
@caret-width-large: ((5px / @font-size-root) + @font-unit);
//** Default `.form-control` height
@input-height-base: (@line-height-computed + (@padding-base-vertical * 2));
//** Large `.form-control` height
@input-height-large: ((@font-size-large * @line-height-large) + (@padding-large-vertical * 2));
//** Small `.form-control` height
@input-height-small: ((@font-size-small * @line-height-small) + (@padding-small-vertical * 2));
// Set root font size
html {
font-size: @font-size-root;
}
// Change styling for elements that mix pixels and ems
pre {
font-size: ( @font-size-base - (1 / @font-size-root) );
}
.form-control-feedback {
width: calc(@input-height-base ~" + 2px");
height: calc(@input-height-base ~" + 2px");
}
.input-lg + .form-control-feedback {
width: calc(@input-height-large ~" + 2px");
height: calc(@input-height-large ~" + 2px");
}
.input-sm + .form-control-feedback {
width: calc(@input-height-small ~" + 2px");
height: calc(@input-height-small ~" + 2px");
}
.form-control {
height: calc(@input-height-base ~" + 2px");
}
.form-horizontal {
.radio, .checkbox, .radio-inline, .checkbox-inline {
padding: @padding-base-vertical;
border: 1px solid transparent;
}
.radio, .checkbox {
min-height: calc((@line-height-computed + @padding-base-vertical) ~"+ 1px");
}
.form-control-static {
padding-top: @padding-base-vertical;
border-top: 1px solid transparent;
padding-bottom: @padding-base-vertical;
border-bottom: 1px solid transparent;
}
@media (min-width: @screen-sm-min) {
.control-label {
padding-top: @padding-base-vertical;
border-top: 1px solid transparent;
}
}
}
@vol7ron
Copy link

vol7ron commented Dec 9, 2014

@ivanthisone yes, viewport width and height are supported and preferred over percentages in certain circumstances.

@steven-pribilinskiy
Copy link

Unfortunately that gist breaks all rules where @line-height-computed is used as a value for margins and paddings as those properties take the element's own font-size as the base size.

Such rules occur 31 times in Bootstrap 3.3.2 and that makes this gist useless unless all those places are patched.

And even after overriding those rules such patching need to be maintained for every new release of Bootstrap.

Hopefully BS4 will have ems/rems as base units

@sponnet
Copy link

sponnet commented Mar 25, 2015

Are there any plans to use rems in BS4 ? We have a working rems version that we use in our company - we could contribute it to BS4. Do you know who maintains the backlog or planning of BS4 ?

@steven-pribilinskiy
Copy link

More info available in a stackoverflow topic and a Github Issue

For those following along, we'll be able to change from pixels to REMs in v4 when we drop IE8 support

@koddo
Copy link

koddo commented Apr 6, 2015

@pribilinskiy, could you please elaborate on why @line-height-computed here breaks those margin and padding rules? I'm not against patching my copy of bootstrap. How to make it work with this gist?

@bisubus
Copy link

bisubus commented May 21, 2015

@koddo, because old @line-height-computed was already applied to the rules that use it, you need to extract all of them and add it to the gist.

@ezersky
Copy link

ezersky commented Oct 3, 2015

Where are variables @line-height-large and @line-height-small ?

@MilosFe
Copy link

MilosFe commented Dec 30, 2015

does this convert all px in bootstrap into ems or just some controls?

Sign up for free to join this conversation on GitHub. Already have an account? Sign in to comment