How to namespace Twitter Bootstrap so styles don't conflict
This turned out to be easier than I thought. Both Less and Sass support namespacing (using the same syntax even). When you include bootstrap, you can do so within a selector to namespace it:
.bootstrap-styles {
@import 'bootstrap';
}
Update: For newer versions of LESS, here's how to do it:
.bootstrap-styles {
@import (less) url("bootstrap.css");
}
A similar question was answered here.
@Andrew great answer. You'll also want to note that bootstrap modifies the body {}, mainly to add font. So when you namespace it via LESS/SASS your output css file looks like this: (in bootstrap 3)
.bootstrap-styles body {
font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
font-size: 14px;
line-height: 1.428571429;
color: #333333;
background-color: white;
}
but obviously there will not be a body tag inside your div, so your bootstrap content will not have the bootstrap font (since all bootstrap inherits font from parent)
To fix, the answer should be:
.bootstrap-styles {
font-family: "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;
font-size: 14px;
line-height: 1.428571429;
color: #333333;
background-color: white;
@import 'bootstrap';
}
Putting @Andrew, @Kevin and @adamj's answers together (plus a few other styles), if you include the following in a file named "bootstrap-namespaced.less", you can simply import 'bootstrap-namespaced.less' into any less file:
// bootstrap-namespaced.less
// This less file is intended to be imported from other less files.
// Example usage:
// my-custom-namespace {
// import 'bootstrap-namespaced.less';
// }
// Import bootstrap.css (but treat it as a less file) to avoid problems
// with the way Bootstrap is using the parent operator (&).
@import (less) 'bootstrap.css';
// Manually include styles using selectors that will not work when namespaced.
@import 'variables.less';
& {
// From normalize.less
// Previously inside "html {"
// font-family: sans-serif; // Overridden below
-ms-text-size-adjust: 100%;
-webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;
// Previously inside "body {"
margin: 0;
// From scaffolding.less
// Previously inside "html {"
// font-size: 10px; // Overridden below
-webkit-tap-highlight-color: rgba(0,0,0,0);
// Previously inside "body {"
font-family: @font-family-base;
font-size: @font-size-base;
line-height: @line-height-base;
color: @text-color;
background-color: @body-bg;
}