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Can anyone suggest some good browser add-on tools/extensions to help with development?
I have firebug installed in Firefox which is great for dealing with CSS, HTML and javascript; any other suggestions?
Firebug
For Firefox:
Firebug is awesome for investigation and development.
Web Developer Toolbar is good also. Really helps with CSS and page layout stuff as well as much more.
I also use Live HTTP Headers (I think it is called, but it is on my work machine, so can't find the link now). Which has helped us out with caching issues and the like.
I do a lot of mobile phone development, so I also use UserAgent Switcher. Very helpful for pretending to be different mobile phones.
I tend to only use Firefox for development, and just test in other browsers as most do not have the extensive range of plugins to aid development that Firefox does.
Firefox:
Inspect This if you use the DOM Inspector at all
Measure It for telling you pixel distances (if you need that)
IE View or Safari View for ease of testing in other browsers
HTML Validator if you care about validation
Console2 to improve your js error console
The Javascript Shell bookmarklet is also handy (and look at the others there as well)
Edit: This is in addition to the Web Development Toolbar mentioned by others
The other must-have for Firefox is Chris Pederick's Web Developer Toolbar.
You should definitely install Safari. It has a number of tools built-in. I use it in combination with other browsers all the time.
Network Timeline
Error Console
Web Inspector
Snippet Editor
Plus it lets you set the user agent for your requests.
Consider this, it has a separate top-level menu called Develop.
Opera has:
Dragonfly (tools -> advanced -> developer tools)
Debug Menu
UserJS methods for intercepting things
opera:config#CompatMode%20Override for forcing quirks or standards mode
Web developer widgets
You can view source of files, edit them, apply changes and reload from cache.
In case of IE, next tools can be useful
Microsoft Developer Toolbar - dom|styles viewer
Fiddler HTTP Debugger - http monitor
Instant source - dom|styles viewer
Companion.JS - dom|styles viewer, extended error console
The "uber" extension for IE - "Developer Tools", provided as a part of IE8
Developer Console and DOM Snapshot for Opera:
http://dev.opera.com/tools/
Awesomeness is that these are bookmarklets implemented with JS. Suckiness is that they require the Internetz.
Firefox:
Inspect This if you use the DOM Inspector at all
Measure It for telling you pixel distances (if you need that)
IE View or Safari View for ease of testing in other browsers
HTML Validator if you care about validation
Console2 to improve your js error console
The Javascript Shell bookmarklet is also handy (and look at the others there as well)
This is in addition to the Web Development Toolbar mentioned by others
This list by Cebjyre is nearly complete (since FireBug was already mentioned in the question). I would only add Tamperdata. From time to time it is very useful.
Here's my development oriented add-ons for Firefox 3:
Web Developer
Firebug
Firecookie
FirePHP
Rainbow
TamperData
Poster
FireFTP
ReloadEvery
Selenium IDE
YSlow is a sweet Firebug addon for troubleshooting a page's load time.
Other than the excellent tools already mentioned, I find Charles to be extremely useful. Especially since I do alot of work with Flash Remoting which it handles excellently.
Charles is an HTTP proxy / HTTP monitor / Reverse Proxy that enables a developer to view all of the HTTP traffic between their machine and the Internet. This includes requests, responses and the HTTP headers (which contain the cookies and caching information).
Charles can act as a man-in-the-middle for HTTP/SSL communication, enabling you to debug the content of your HTTPS sessions.
It's crossplatform, costs $50, but there's a "30 minute per session"-evaluation you can download.
Here's what I use:
Firefox:
DOM Inspector: I use this more than anything else for web development
Launchy: for opening sites in other browsers/apps
Tamper Data: this can be helpful for debugging GET/POST requests
Web Developer Toolbar: this has so many handy features for debugging: the W3C validation tools, built-in ruler, resizing tools, source manipulation, easy cache/css/script tools
IE:
Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar: nowhere near as handy as the Firefox one, but at least it gives you a decent DOM Inspector
Misc:
Jesse's handy bookmarklets: the shell bookmarklet is especially handy
I also install Safari and Opera, but mostly just use them for testing and benchmarking since their dev tools aren't as robust as Firefox, and they aren't as buggy as IE.
Lynx: I use this to make sure that any JS-heavy sites still work so that I'm sure they'll look OK to google, screen readers, and any other bot-like app.
Related
I'm working on an app on my machine and run it on local host. Sometimes browsers dev tools are not accurate and once I am making the changes in my code and then run, it doesn't look like how it was in dev tools. I'm talking about some alignment, responsiveness, not about styling, colors etc.
When I am comparing my app in different browsers it doesn't look the same in all of them, so I'm no sure which one is actually the accurate view.
I have tried Edge, Opera, Mozilla, Chrome. My company is monitoring my pc, so I can't install random stuff on it.
Is there any other option to preview accurately my app? Any extension or some site?
Thanks in advance.
You can always use other browsers like Opera which has developer mode, as well as, Microsoft Edge and Safari that offer web development tools. As for the alternatives for Firefox, I believe it was already answered, check this: What are the alternatives to the Firefox Developer Tools?
Moreover, these might not directly solve your problem but if you are looking for plugins or apps, check these useful tools out: Plunker, Percy, Ghost Inspector, Requestly.
I have been developing Chrome extensions and as I have already mentioned in a question on SO, I have problems paying that starting charge witch Google asks. So I quit wasting my time developing extensions for a company that has no respect for developers and I'm starting to develop Firefox add-ons. So I'm a total newbie in this area.
First of all I have to mention that I am NOT looking for an automatic functionality/way to convert them. I have noticed that one difference between Firefox add-ons and Chrome extensions is that there is not such a thing as popup.html in Firefox (maybe I'm wrong).
How can I find other main differences so that I can convert my extensions to Firefox add-on?
Firefox addons do have a popup paneil in their SDK available to use(https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/developers/docs/sdk/latest/modules/sdk/panel.html).
I'm developing a Firefox addon right now and I can tell you that their actual SDK and the develop environments are great, cfx to work offline or the online builder, both are powerful and easy.
Regarding the differences that you ask, besides a few structure differences and of course Chrome or Firefox specific code that is not going to work in the other platform, I think that it should be easy port an addon from one platform to another, no automatic but pretty straightforward.
I am a web developer looking to build a browser extension. What is the best way to build browser extensions using web technologies (HTML, Javsacript, etc). We are targeting IE and Firefox only. Can IE browser toolbars be created using HTML/Javascript?
There is a bit of confusion here. Your question title says you are looking to develop a "Browser Toolbar", but in the question body itself you are asking about "Browser Extensions".
Its important to understand that in general Browser Toolbars are a subset of a Browser Extension. If you are indeed looking though to develop a Cross Browser Extension and not a toolbar I would really recommend the use of Crossrider - a development framework for cross-browser extensions.
They do not allow you develop toolbars, but they do have an online IDE and an extensive API to build cross-browser extensions for Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox and Safari with basic knowledge of JavaScript and jQuery.
Have a look at this article where they discuss using HTML and Javascript to build an extension for firefox.
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Closed 11 years ago.
I am in a position where I can choose the client browser for my web app. The app is being used internally, and we are installing each client "manually".I would like to find a better solution for the browser,so :
What is a good browser that I can use as a client to a web application?
General functionalities I would like to have:
opening the browser from a
shortcut, directly to the application's URL
ability to restrict navigation to a set of allowed URLs
fullscreen mode, no menu, no address bar
javascript
good CSS support
ability to cancel Back button (or at least solve the "Webpage has expired" IE problem)
IE7 and FireFox are good candidates, but each seem to have it's own problems and issues.
Mozilla Prism seems ideal for your purposes.
It shares code with Firefox but is designed to run web applications without the usual Browser interface to make them appear more like desktop applications. So no back button or address bar to worry about.
Edit: Google Chrome has Application Shortcuts so that may now be a better option.
Your last point, solving the "webpage has expired" problem, can be solved entirely on the server side by judicious use of the "303 see other" HTTP status code. Instead of returning a new page immediately as the result of an HTTP POST, return a 303 result code that redirects to another page that is a GET, that gets the contents you would like to show. This allows the user to use the back button without getting that expired message.
Because of your specific requirements you might want to consider embedding the IE ActiveX into a desktop application. That way you get full control of the client.
Firefox with a little elbow grease is your best bet. I've written locked down extensions (one that's full screen and great for digital signage) as well as Live CD to ease deployment.
Firefox:
multi-platform
kiosk add-on
patch the chrome logic with zip and javascript
see the FF 3.1 javascript speed improvements
easily deploy standard bookmarks
Although I realize this may not be an option yet, Google Chrome seems to have some features that have been added specifically to allow that. Again, maybe not usable, yet, but certainly very interesting!
(See also the Chrome presentation, 27:30)
Some other reasons to choose Firefox:
Firebug
Web Developer
Tamper Data
These addons make it a lot easier to develop web application for.
Until people have more experience with Google Chrome I would think Firefox is a better choice. It is extendable, well supported.
I like Chrome, but Google just have the tendency to have long beta periods and some times abandon projects.
When you run into serious issues, with Firefox you can trace it down to the code and maybe get someone to fix it. With IE, you can't.
I've been utlising a "web browser control" in desktop based applications (in my case Windows Forms .NET) for a number of years. I mostly use it to create a familiar flow-based user interface that also allows a seamless transition to the internet where required.
I'm really tired of the IE browser control because of the poor quality html it generates on output. Also, I guess that it is really just IE7 behind the scenes and so has many of that browser "issues". Despite this, it is quite a powerful control and provides rich interaction with your desktop app.
So, what other alternatives to the IE browser control are there? I looked at a Mosaic equivalent a year ago but was disappointed with the number of unimplemented features, maybe this has improved recently?
hmm..Interestingly
Mozilla seems to provide ActiveX control
K-Melon is another Gecko based browser control
Popular layout engines:
Mozilla Gecko
KHTML
WebKit (based on KHTML)
Though I'm not sure how easy it is to embed those in a .Net app.