---
layout: post
title: "Basic Gulp Build for Sass"
date: 2019-01-15
---


Some designers might shy away from build tools when first starting out and I can understand the reasoning - task runners like `gulp` and `grunt` can seem daunting at first. So, I've decided to showcase my go-to setup for `gulp` and explain what the heck it does step-by-step. 

Here is the final `gulp.js` file in all it's glory:


    var gulp = require('gulp');
    var shell = require('gulp-shell');
    var sass = require('gulp-sass');
    
    /* Build and watch Jekyll (change this task to whatever you need) */
    gulp.task('generate', shell.task('jekyll serve'));
    
    /* Compile SCSS files to CSS */
    gulp.task('styles', function () {
        return gulp.src('_includes/assets/sass/styles.scss')
            .pipe(sass({
                outputStyle: 'compressed'
            }).on('error', sass.logError))
            .pipe(gulp.dest('_includes/assets/css/'));
    });
    
    /* Compile the assets */
    gulp.task('assets', gulp.parallel(
        'styles'
    ));
    
    /* Build */
    gulp.task('build', gulp.series(
        'assets',
        'generate'
    ));


Trust me, it's not complicated at all.

## Grabbing what we need

For our basic build file we are going to need only three modules: `gulp`, `gulp-shell` and `gulp-sass`.


    var gulp = require('gulp');
    var shell = require('gulp-shell');
    var sass = require('gulp-sass');


#### gulp
This is the streaming build system, without it we can't do anything else.

#### gulp-shell
A gulp command line interface for us to interact with our terminal.

#### gulp-sass
Required for gulp to compile Sass into vanilla CSS.

#### Bonus tasks

<p>You can also toss in <code>gulp-minify</code> to clean-up any JavaScript you might be using, but for this example we're just going to keep things simple and focus on Sass only.</p>

<p class="no-margin">Maybe I'll write about my <code>js</code> build workflow in a future article.</p>

## Generating the build

Our first step is to create the default task that will generate our build. In this example we are making the assumption that we're building a Jekyll website (but you can place any build command here):


    gulp.task('generate', shell.task('jekyll serve'));


Don't worry if this `generate` isn't clear, we come back to that later.

## Processing our pre-processor

We will name this next task `styles` since that's what it outputs - our styling. We start by telling gulp where our main `scss` directory is:


    /* Change this directory to match yours */
    return gulp.src('_includes/assets/sass/styles.scss')


This next piece tells the plugin to compress our final compiled CSS, log any errors if there are issues with the build and then export it to our destination directory:


    .pipe(sass({
        outputStyle: 'compressed'
    }).on('error', sass.logError))

    /* Change this to your destination directory */
    .pipe(gulp.dest('_includes/assets/css/'));


## Building our assets

This step isn't 100% needed, but I like to include it for when more assets need to be added (minifying JavaScript, compressing images, etc)


    /*
    Compile the assets
    */
    gulp.task('assets', gulp.parallel(
        'styles'
    ));


## Altogether now!

Now we add a task that runs all other tasks in our gulp file (in this case it will run both `assets` and `generate`)


    /*
    Build
    */
    gulp.task('build', gulp.series(
        'assets',
        'generate'
    ));


And that's it - we're done! A very basic `gulp` build for compiling Sass.