Philosophy

Here we are trying to lay out some of the underlying philoshophy behind SMURF and why a modular approach to frontend code is important.

Why the cascade will "bite you in the ass"! or Depth of applicability

As can be derived from the name the cascading characteristic is pretty central to CSS and certainly useful in certain situations. However, especially in big complex applications and team environments, it can unfortunately get into your way more often than it helps. Therefore, we need to use it carefully and with thought. It certainly makes sense to leverage the cascade for base styles, for example a base font-size, link color, etc., but besides that it is much more obvious if you try to contain the cascading as much as possible through the use of modules. This is a good way to control the depth of applicability. It might not be as elegant as as mastering the cascade, but it will drastically reduce the WTF ratio in a scenario described above (complex app, big team).