---
title: Compass Documentation
crumb: Docs
body_id: home
---
%article
  %h1#logo Compass

  :markdown
    Compass is a stylesheet authoring tool that uses the Sass stylesheet
    language to make your stylesheets smaller and your web site easier to
    maintain. Compass provides ports of the best of breed css frameworks
    that you can use without forcing you to use their presentational class
    names. It’s a new way of thinking about stylesheets that must be seen
    in action!
    
    <object width="700" height="438"><param name="allowfullscreen" value="true" /><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always" /><param name="movie" value="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=11671458&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;show_title=1&amp;show_byline=0&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=00ADEF&amp;fullscreen=1" /><embed src="http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=11671458&amp;server=vimeo.com&amp;show_title=1&amp;show_byline=0&amp;show_portrait=0&amp;color=00ADEF&amp;fullscreen=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always" width="700" height="438"></embed></object><p><a href="http://vimeo.com/11671458">An introduction to Compass</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/ltackett">Lorin Tackett</a> on <a href="http://vimeo.com">Vimeo</a>.</p>
    
    ## Installing
    
    Compass is a tool that runs on the command line.
    
    On any system with ruby installed, open your terminal and type:
    
        gem install compass
    
    This will install Compass and Sass too. Verify that compass is installed:
    
        compass version
    
    ## Creating a stand-alone project
    
        compass create myproject
        mate myproject
        compass watch myproject
    
    If you don't have TextMate, substitute the `mate myproject` part with the text
    editor of your choice. Edit the `*.scss` files in the `src` directory.
    These files are yours and you can change them as you see fit, delete them,
    make new ones, etc. Compass will automatically compile them into css in the
    `stylesheets` directory whenever they change.
    
    ## Rails Support
    
        compass init rails /path/to/myrailsproject
    
    ## Installing a framework
    
    When creating a new project:
    
        compass create myproject --using blueprint/basic
    
    When installing into an existing project:
    
        cd myproject
        compass install blueprint/semantic
    
    With Rails:
    
        compass init rails /path/to/myrailsproject --using blueprint/semantic
    
    ## Bugs Reports, Discussions, Support
    
    Send a note to the [mailing list](http://groups.google.com/group/compass-users)
    and/or [File a bug](http://github.com/chriseppstein/compass/issues).