text: Q:
  
  Do web frameworks such as Bootstrap or HTML5 boilerplate offer anything to a designer (not developer)?
  
  Note, this is about design much more than development. 
  I build sites from scratch with completely hand written CSS and HTML.
  I've known about pre-build css templates such as Bootstrap or HTML5 Boilerplate for some time. I've looked at them a briefly in the past but never jumped into actually using them for anything. I don't have any issues resetting CSS, or including javascript when needed, or configuring for viewports.
  This evening, I coded a basic HTML5/CSS page. Nothing really earth-shattering in terms of layout. Simply a jumping off point. Afterwards I decided to give Bootstrap a whirl with the same layout. It's a pretty standard 960px, 3 column with hero image page. 
  
  As I'm altering Bootstrap it occurred to me that 80% or more of my time was being spent learning what class or id was applied to something, then finding that in the CSS to adjust. It became clear that Bootstrap was not going to save me any time at all. In fact, Bootstrap would greatly increase production times due to the *overly templated CSS.
  *(by "overly templated" I mean there's a great deal of CSS I probably wouldn't use for any given web site. Not that there is unnecessary CSS on the whole.)
  I understand that if I were familiar with Bootstrap I would be familiar with class/id names and general location in the stylesheets. So, I'm willing to bend a bit on the time it was taking me, realizing that some of it was due to my own unfamiliarity.
  However, I can't help but wonder if Bootstrap et. al. are merely crutches which are crippling designers by spoon feeding them their own brand of code. Thus locking in a consumer base which will rely entirely on a third party solution and it's functionality for everything, or at least the majority. It reminds me of those that can only design a web site if they can use Dreamweaver. And heaven forbid if they don't have access to Dreamweaver and a change is needed.
  When I build a site I use my own set of standard class and ID names. I structure CSS how it's intuitive for me. I have my own set of pre-build templates for quick set up. Therefore any site I build I can edit fairly quickly. Using any of the pre-configured front-end packages simply means I need to learn their naming conventions and their structure rather than relying on my own.
  
  Can anyone extoll upon me the great virtues of such templating systems as Bootstrap or HTML5 Boilerplate?
  What makes them valuable to you?
  Are you merely familiar with the system you use so you can navigate it easily or do you still have to hunt for items?
  Could you build a site without them if you had to?
  
  A:
  
  The advantages tend to be primarily:
  
  Rapid Prototyping (ie, speed)
  Built-in Cross browser consistency
  
  If you need to create a grid, and the grid you need to create fits the pre-built CSS framework, then the logic is that you're halfway there by using the framework. 
  All that said, I tend to agree with you. CSS frameworks, IMHO, are like visual design templates in that if they meet 90% of your objective, they're great, but if they don't, then you're spending way more time and effort modifying the default vs. just building your own froms scratch.
  ADDENDUM:
  I should add one more potential benefit:
  
  it's a documented system
  
  In an enterprise environment, where you may have several front end developers, and the project may span several years with several different teams of front end developers, having a documented underlying presentation layer framework can help. 
  That's not to say your own home-built framework can't be documented, it's just that documentation is often not a priority.
  
  A:
  
  I'm familiar with HTML5 Boilerplate, but I'm more familiar with Bootstrap, so I'll talk about that. Remember that both are geared towards two different tasks, (H5BP is a responsive normalised template, Bootstrap is a collection of HTML/CSS/JS widgets and a responsive grid.) In fact they can be used together.
  
  However, I can't help but wonder if Bootstrap et. al. are merely crutches which are crippling designers by spoon feeding them their own brand of code. Thus locking in a consumer base which will rely entirely on a third party solution and it's functionality for everything, or at least the majority. It reminds me of those that can only design a web site if they can use Dreamweaver. And heaven forbid if they don't have access to Dreamweaver and a change is needed.
  
  Analogy fails here because you have full access to Bootstrap source. If you don't like how something works, you can change it. To me it's the opposite of a  crutch — you can use the source code to learn css techniques.
  I don't agree that "designing a website" needs to be that close to the metal any more than I believe C coders need to have intimate knowledge of assembly language. Although even that analogy falls flat because adjusting HTML/CSS is simply a matter of extending selectors and adding what you need.
  
  Can anyone extoll upon me the great virtues of such templating systems as Bootstrap or HTML5 Boilerplate?
  
  The killer feature of Bootstrap, for me, is the consistent and easy to apply widget styling and Javascript components. Want a link to look like a button? Add a '.btn' class. Want a table? Add a '.table' class. Want a navigation element? Set up an unordered list and add navigation classes.
  Dropdowns, popovers, alerts, etc. are easily added to elements with data- attributes. Bootstrap includes a very nice looking set of icons that can be easily integrated into widgets.
  
  What makes them valuable to you?
  
  Can quickly prototype sites 
  All the debugging of cross-browser and cross-platform css has been done for me.
  Easily customised CSS with a wide selection of variables so I can experiment and prototype layouts quickly.
  Standard navigation widgets
  Source code open and free, I can get my hands dirty and customise the LESS if I need a new mixin or change behaviour the way I need.
  
  Are you merely familiar with the system you use so you can navigate it easily or do you still have to hunt for items?
  
  One of the biggest features of Bootstrap is its excellent documentation. I can navigate it easily and css selectors are intuitive and easy to remember.
  
  Could you build a site without them if you had to?
  
  Yes, but it's clearly more work. I can focus on UX and rapidly prototype layouts with finished good looking widgets and consistent functionality.
  
  A:
  
  The nice thing about templating systems and frameworks is that they can save you a lot of time iff you work the way they want you to. So, with Bootstrap, once you learn their semantics for doing a JS carousel, it's almost criminally simple to implement. Also, Bootstrap seems to get a lot simpler if you either roll your own before you get started or use something like bootstrap-sass in Rails to change those variables on the fly; it'll save you from changing everything around later.
  DA01 talks about browser consistency...that's a big factor for me. That's why I use jQuery even though any number of folks over at SO will remind you that adding a large library just to do a few things is a waste of resources. I know that when I use jQuery, it'll work across a certain set of browsers, and so even though I can probably achieve a more lightweight solution on my own, I've found it more beneficial to learn how jQuery wants me to write JavaScript and then do it their way.
  In the end, I tend to find HTML/CSS frameworks restrictive; I'm enough of a control freak that I still like to code by hand when I can. But, I respect the fact that people smarter and more advanced than me spent a lot of time to set these templates/frameworks up.
  
  