When comparing Initializr vs HTML5 Boilerplate, the Slant community recommends HTML5 Boilerplate for most people. In the question“What are the best boilerplates for modern webapp front-end development?” HTML5 Boilerplate is ranked 1st while Initializr is ranked 2nd. The most important reason people chose HTML5 Boilerplate is:
These configuration files may help increase performance of the webapp.
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Pros
Pro Integrates Twitter Bootstrap and HTML5 Boilerplate
Initializr allows you to "fine-tune" your template by allowing you to take the good stuff from both HTML5BP and Twitter Bootstrap and download a mashed up basic template, which you can begin development on.
Pro Well documented
Initializr is very well documented, even though it itself being a pretty easy to understand and use tool. The documentations are available in different languages as well, available via the International Guides section on the website.
Pro Speed: Setup time is significantly reduced
With initializr, very little setup is needed. All you need to do to be ready for development is provide your favorite template maker (HTML5BP or Bootstrap).
Pro HTML5 templates generator
It's not really a template by itself but allows you to create a custom template from known good technologies.
Pro Includes a comprehensive set of server configuration files
These configuration files may help increase performance of the webapp.
Pro Includes Modernizr
Modernizr checks browser support for HTML5, CSS3, as well as a few other miscellaneous elements and allows for easily writing fallbacks if they're not supported.
Pro Documented and undocumented versions
To help out newcommers to either programming in general or HTML5 Boilerplate specifically, the boilerplate includes in-depth docs that help understand how things work and why certain choices are made. The documentation is highly comprehensive going even as far as to describe every single line of normalize.css that the H5BP includes.
Pro Cross-browser normalization
H5BP includes normalize.css that will help fix inconsistencies in the way browsers render elements.
Pro Performance optimizations
HTML5 Boilerplate theme doesn't only provide a base template for building your next modern site. It also has performance optimization features built into it which include stuff like html + js minification , image size reduction as well as css minification. This link here describes how to optimize your shiny new html5 site using these built in features.
Pro Optional support for XHR and Flash
With optional support for XHR, we can use techniques such as XHR eval and XHR injections to optimize the loading of external scripts and significantly reduce page load times. Alongside XHR, built-in support for Flash means that you can use your old swf/flash content on your website, where you feel you're not ready for HTML5 yet.
Cons
Con Is going to be retired at the end of 2017
It's been anounced on their homepage that Initializr will be retired at the end of 2017.
Con No ZURB Foundation support
Some developers much prefer Foundation over Bootstrap due to the flexible grid and large selection of widgets. However, Initializr supports only Bootstrap.
Con Not a complete solution
HTML5 Boilerplate is basically just that, a template or a basis on which to build an HTML page. It doesn't have much mark up or components out of the box. In other words, it doesn't provide all the components and tools needed to build a UI, it contains best practices and a generall template on which to build your UI.
