What apps do fellow web developers use?

[s0l1dsnak3123]

I'll start off with what I use:


I use Geany for all my text-editing
FileZilla for FTP (I love the edit from FTP functionality of FileZilla)
Meld Diff Viewer for viewing and editing Diffs
Rabbit VCS (http://wiki.rabbitvcs.org/wiki/) for tortoiseSVN-like version control through subversion
GIMP for almost all my web designing (yes, that's right :))
Alarm Clock for keeping basic schedules
Tasque for basic task management
Dropbox for backing up miscellaneous files
DestroyTwitter for tweeting (yes, I consider that part of my job)
Regexr (http://www.gskinner.com/RegExr/) (Adobe Air) for regex
Xampp for my development server
Inkscape for Vector Illustration
xara xtreme LE (http://www.xaraxtreme.org/) For vector illustration


Firefox Extensions:

Firebug
Web Developer Toolbar
Xmarks
colorzilla


What do my fellow Ubuntu web developers use? Do you have any specific work-flow with your Linux Apps that you tend to follow?

[Crunchy the Headcrab]

I don't really do web development but I did it a little bit in the past. I think that GIMP makes a great design tool for raster images. In fact, I prefer it to PS in a lot of ways. I do miss Illustrator for logos and stuff though.

[hoagie]

gVim for markup
Dolphin for managing remote files
GIMP for image editing
Konsole for ssh
FreeBSD web server as a testing environment

[NoaHall]

Geany.
Then I either directly access the servers using the terminal, or use SVN(thanks to someone showing it to me)

GIMP for background creation.

[s0l1dsnak3123]

I don't really do web development but I did it a little bit in the past. I think that GIMP makes a great design tool for raster images. In fact, I prefer it to PS in a lot of ways. I do miss Illustrator for logos and stuff though.

Yes, GIMP is an awesome tool for design, despite what many say.

How could I forget Vector Illustration! I use Inkscape or xara xtreme LE (http://www.xaraxtreme.org/) for that, which I prefer over Illustrator for its simplicity.

[sloggerkhan]

I use firebug, geany, gimp, and inkscape for nearly all of the web work I do. (To be fair, I guess ssh/bash might be included, too.)

[Frak]

Photoshop
Illustrator (with AI -> XAML plugin)
Expression Studio
Calculator
Visual Studio 2010
Microsoft Silverlight (I've ditched Flash by now)

Windows Server 2008 R2 for load and security testing. ASP.NET, JSP, and ColdFusion development as well.

[PartisanEntity]

For web development I use the following:

FF Extensions:

Web Developer Toolbar
Firebug
Dummy Lipsum
POW

Applications:

BBEdit
CSSEdit
Dreamweaver
Photoshop
MAMP
Coda
OpenProj
OpenOffice

Websites:

http://browsershots.org/
http://kuler.adobe.com/
http://bgpatterns.com/

[squilookle]

I use
Notepad++ and Bluefish for html, css, php and asp
GIMP for images and playing with layouts
Adobe Flash
A few Firefox add ons

[robwgibbons]

Coding: I use Gedit for all of my coding (mostly PHP, JavaScript, Python, HTML and CSS), making use of various plug-ins to enhance its functionality such as Session Saver, Snippets, Split View 2, Tabs Extend and a few others.

A reasonably comprehensive list of Gedit plugins can be found at Gnome Live (http://live.gnome.org/Gedit/Plugins).

Graphics: For most graphical tasks, such as producing pre-development website mockups, I use GIMP. Unfortunately I do not have much experience with Inkscape, and thus am not well practiced in producing vector graphics (anything requiring vector design I usually leave up to an associate who uses various Adobe tools.) This is a main point on which I would like to improve.

FTP: For FTP I use the built-in FTP capabilities of Nautilus, which I find to be simple and straight-forward. The integrated aspect of Nautilus makes using it for FTP purposes very intuitive, in addition to not having to install a stand-alone FTP client.

Terminal: This one may seem odd, but for times when I need to SSH into my server, test out various Python functions, or change file permissions, I can do most of this through the Terminal. In addition, I do most of my installations via the Terminal (such as installing a local LAMP server for development).

Error Console: This is something I nearly forgot to mention. Firefox's integrated Error Console makes debugging advanced JavaScript applications much simpler, and is something web developers can really take advantage of.

I am very interested in hearing from other web developers who use Ubuntu. Specifically, what do you use to test/debug your code (specifically JavaScript)? Also, what do you use to produce vector graphics?

[s0l1dsnak3123]

FTP: For FTP I use the built-in FTP capabilities of Nautilus, which I find to be simple and straight-forward. The integrated aspect of Nautilus makes using it for FTP purposes very intuitive, in addition to not having to install a stand-alone FTP client.


I always liked nautilus' FTP, but last time I used it, it was quite buggy and the connection frequently died, as well as the programs using it. I like FileZilla, but I would prefer to have one less window open at a time. Would you say that nautilus' FTP is now stable enough for a production environment?


what do you use to test/debug your code (specifically JavaScript)? Also, what do you use to produce vector graphics?

I use firebug for debugging JavaScript, and Inkscape of xara extreme LE for vector illustration.

[hessiess]

GVim, GIMP, SVN(replacement for FTP etc, much better), Apache, PHP, Firefox, Vimperator.

the FTP protocol is obsolete.

[lovinglinux]

kate (apt:kate) for text-editing
gftp (apt:gftp) and dolphin (apt:dolphin) for file transfer
meld (apt:meld) for diffs
esvn (apt:esvn) for version control through subversion
gimp (apt:gimp) for image editing
xampp for development server
konsole and plasmacon for all sorts of things


Firefox Extensions:

SQLite Manager (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5817)
Web Developer (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/60)
Nightly Tester tools (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/6543)
Dummy Lipsum (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2064)
Colorzilla (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/271)
Quick Restart (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/3559)
Screengrab (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1146)


Web Applications:

Joomla (http://www.joomla.org/) for all my web sites

[Jose Catre-Vandis]

Follow up question, any clever tricks for testing IE/in IE without Windows?

[hessiess]

Follow up question, any clever tricks for testing IE/in IE without Windows?

Run it in a VM, or VNC into another computer.

[s0l1dsnak3123]

Run it in a VM, or VNC into another computer.

That's what I do, but it doesn't really fix the problem - you still need a copy of windows to do that. Another workaround is to use IE4Linux (http://www.tatanka.com.br/ies4linux/page/Main_Page), although I never really tried it out :)

[Frak]

Follow up question, any clever tricks for testing IE/in IE without Windows?
Browsershots

[autonomy]

KompoZer and GVim. Wine or VirtualBox for testing in IE. We just had this thread last week

[s0l1dsnak3123]

KompoZer and GVim. Wine or VirtualBox for testing in IE. We just had this thread last week

Really? I did a search an didn't see one... my bad :KS

[autonomy]

no problem, didn't start out the same but ended that way http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1319151

[cartman640]

My development is split between Mac OS and Ubuntu.

On Mac I use:
TextMate - Great text editor with bundles for PHP, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, SQL, etc

Transmit - Great FTP client, unfortunately I still need FTP to get sites onto the production server.

CSSEdit - Nice interface for editing CSS, and the ability to extract and modify CSS from another site and see the changes live is nice.

On Ubuntu:
Eclipse + Aptana + some other extensions for PHP/HTML. It's really a bit heavy but certainly does everything and anything you could ever want.

Git: Git is awesome, I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone else using it in this thread, much nicer than Subversion, for starters it supports remote repositories (as in 'git push server' pushes all new changes to my testing server which also has a complete version history), oh, and it's much faster.

There's probably a few other applications there that I can't think of right now, although I don't really need Photoshop, Illustrator, etc as I'm a developer, not a designer.

[s0l1dsnak3123]

My development is split between Mac OS and Ubuntu.

Can I ask you an honest question? What is it that draws developers toward mac? I have almost no experience with a mac, so I don't understand the qualities it has that makes it so inviting to the web crowd.


Git: Git is awesome, I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone else using it in this thread, much nicer than Subversion, for starters it supports remote repositories (as in 'git push server' pushes all new changes to my testing server which also has a complete version history), oh, and it's much faster.
I've been meaning to get to know GIT for some time. Is there any specific tutorial you could recommend?

[lightningfox]

I'm learning web development.

I use:


LAMP (for testing my websites)

GIMP (raster image editing)

Inkscape (Vector image editing)

Kompozer (WYSIWYG web development program)

Quanta Plus

Bluefish

Kate text editor

[hessiess]

Git: Git is awesome, I'm surprised I haven't seen anyone else using it in this thread, much nicer than Subversion, for starters it supports remote repositories (as in 'git push server' pushes all new changes to my testing server which also has a complete version history), oh, and it's much faster.

Last time I checked, GIT couldn't check in over HTTPS, unlike SVN. Being able to checkin over HTTPS means that you can work from anywhere, even behind restrictive firewalls without messing with SSH tunnels or a VPN. Also, from my experiences, the whole `distributed' model does not work well for managing web servers, which are, by design, centralised.

[wojox]

Follow up question, any clever tricks for testing IE/in IE without Windows?



<!--[if IE]>
<?php
header("Location: http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/");
?>
<![endif]-->



gedit

[hessiess]

<!--[if IE]>
<?php
header("Location: http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/");
?>
<![endif]-->



gedit

Wouldn't work, mixes server and client functionality, that would always redirect regardless of the browser. Use JavaScript.

[s0l1dsnak3123]

Wouldn't work, mixes server and client functionality, that would always redirect regardless of the browser. Use JavaScript.

Why bother using javascript when you can slap a meta redirect in there? it's in the header, remember :P (you can actually place meta redirects anywhere ;))

[hessiess]

Why bother using javascript when you can slap a meta redirect in there? it's in the header, remember :P (you can actually place meta redirects anywhere ;))

Yes, a meta redirect would also work. I was mainly pointing out that the original code wouldn't work because the PHP is executed server side before it gets anywhere near the browser.

[wojox]

I know. It was a bad joke. :D

[Jose Catre-Vandis]

I know. It was a bad joke. :D

I enjoyed it :)

[-grubby]

I use Kate for text editing, and since most of my web development is in Django, I make pretty extensive use of manage.py for any given project.

I'm not too great of a web designer, so I hardly ever make images, but if I had to, I'd use paint.net

Also, I use scp (command line) or winscp for file transfers, and Cherokee web server runs on my VPS.

[siimo]

Visual Studio 2008 SP1 - html, javascript, css and server code editing, debugging
Visual Studio 2008 Team System - for source control
Visual Studio 2008 Team Build - for automated builds
Visual Studio 2008 Test Project - for automated unit tests
ASP.NET AJAX - ajax
Firebug/IE8 Developer Toolbar - css debugging
WinMarge - diff tool
Notepad++ - lightweight source / config file editing
Paint.NET - for amateur image editing
jQuery

[Tibuda]

Text editor: GVim
Image editor: GIMP
Version control: Git
FTP client: GFTP
Local server: Lighttpd
Server-side languages: PHP or Rails
JavaScript library: jQuery
Webdev-related Firefox extensions: Firebug and HTML validator

[cartman640]

Can I ask you an honest question? What is it that draws developers toward mac? I have almost no experience with a mac, so I don't understand the qualities it has that makes it so inviting to the web crowd.
Well for me, I started with a MacBookPro, which I bought when my only criteria for a laptop was quality and price was no issue. From there I came to love the software, the polish and the general intuitiveness of the system in general. There are some great power tools too, which allow nearly total control of the computer with just the keyboard. Of course at the end of the day it is personal preference, and I find working with Mac OS to be very productive, and a very "complete" operating system.

Of course I'm looking at things from a developer's point of view, I'm not sure how to explain why Macs are so popular with designers, I guess only a designer would be able to answer that.


I've been meaning to get to know GIT for some time. Is there any specific tutorial you could recommend?
I don't really have any specific brilliant tutorial that I can think of, if you're familiar with Subversion already, the Git-SVN crash course could be a place to start:
http://git-scm.com/course/svn.html

Also there is quite a bit of information to be found through the documentation part of the Git website:
http://git-scm.com/documentation

I have a diagram that I found somewhere saved at work, which shows the basic Git workflow and is a good quick reference, I'll try and find it tomorrow at work.


Last time I checked, GIT couldn't check in over HTTPS, unlike SVN. Being able to checkin over HTTPS means that you can work from anywhere, even behind restrictive firewalls without messing with SSH tunnels or a VPN. Also, from my experiences, the whole `distributed' model does not work well for managing web servers, which are, by design, centralised.

Well I found the distributed repository a good thing, especially when using more than one web server. I probably could do what I'm currently doing with SVN, but it would be much, much more work. Also having a local repository is great, I can develop a new component, committing locally as I go without causing anyone else working on the same project any problems running it. Then when I'm finished, a push to the main repository (and a merge if needed) has my new feature deployed to all other instances of a project. This could be achieved with SVN through the uses of branches and merges I guess, but it doesn't seem anywhere near as clean, especially working remotely. These are however my personal opinions, I'm not trying to start a huge version control system debate :P

As for checking in over HTTPS, while it's not an issue for me as I just use Git over SSH, I can see where you're coming from, but a quick Google reveals that it is possible:
http://www.kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/howto/setup-git-server-over-http.txt

[Tibuda]

Can I ask you an honest question? What is it that draws developers toward mac? I have almost no experience with a mac, so I don't understand the qualities it has that makes it so inviting to the web crowd.

Mac OS X is a *nix system that can run Adobe suite natively. Makes sense for those using Flash or Photoshop.

Textmate seens very good for a non-modal editor, but I would use MacVim instead.

[PartisanEntity]

Since we are on the topic, does anyone know of any good websites with good tutorials on combining flash with xml? I have to learn the basics.

Thanks!

[MasterNetra]

Follow up question, any clever tricks for testing IE/in IE without Windows?

1. Install PlayonLinux
2. Run it and install IE7
3. Tell IE7 setup no to installing updates during the installation, just hangs and holds up or at least thats what it did for me at the time, your mileage may vary.

You of course can install ie6 via winetricks..but why stick with 6 when you can have 7?

[NoaHall]

1. Install PlayonLinux
2. Run it and install IE7
3. Tell IE7 setup no to installing updates during the installation, just hangs and holds up or at least thats what it did for me at the time, your mileage may vary.

You of course can install ie6 via winetricks..but why stick with 6 when you can have 7?

Because people still use 6, so you have to test it.

[Frak]

Since we are on the topic, does anyone know of any good websites with good tutorials on combining flash with xml? I have to learn the basics.

Thanks!
I can't give you much insight into Flash, but Flex should do just as well (they both use Actionscript 3.0 for the nitty-gritty).

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flex/quickstart/accessing_xml_data/

[Tibuda]

You of course can install ie6 via winetricks..but why stick with 6 when you can have 7?


Because people still use 6, so you have to test it.

And IE6 is the only IE that really gives me headaches. I don't have much problem with IE7 or IE8.

[sloggerkhan]

Because people still use 6, so you have to test it.

Or you could redirect them to message telling them they use a lame browser and should upgrade.

[ve4cib]

I would not be at all surprised if most (all?) of these have already shown up in the thread, but here's my list...

All Platforms
- Firefox + Firebug + HTML Validator
- Geany
- GIMP
- Inkscape
- Filezilla and/or Firefox + FireFTP (depending on mood and current needs)


Windows Development Work mostly
- Visual Studio (got to use this at work -- but even then all of my HTML and most of my JS coding is done in Geany)
- Flex Builder (had to use this at work a few times -- I HATE Flex with a passion now)
- IETester (this is a great app for testing those obnoxious IE quirks)
- IIS7, PHP5 for IIS


Linux Server Home/hobby use mostly
- Apache, PHP5
- MonoDevelop (spare-time experiments -- I've only just started playing with it)

[Frak]

- Flex Builder (had to use this at work a few times -- I HATE Flex with a passion now)

Have you thought about going into Silverlight development? I haven't had much trouble convincing clients to use it, since it's from Microsoft. I like it a lot more because I am able to use Expression Studio and VS, which I, my opinion, feel are superior to Eclipse + Flex Builder. Again, my opinion, but I like working with ASP.NET (or PHP5 for IIS) and Visual Studio for my work. They feel more natural to me.

But, hey, try it out, you may like it.

[ve4cib]

Have you thought about going into Silverlight development? I haven't had much trouble convincing clients to use it, since it's from Microsoft. I like it a lot more because I am able to use Expression Studio and VS, which I, my opinion, feel are superior to Eclipse + Flex Builder. Again, my opinion, but I like working with ASP.NET (or PHP5 for IIS) and Visual Studio for my work. They feel more natural to me.

But, hey, try it out, you may like it.

I have used Silverlight for a few projects at work too, but not nearly as much as Flex. Some of our clients are die-hard Flex-addicts, and convincing them to use anything else is essentially impossible. Usually their concerns are about cross-OS support (let's face it: Silverlight on anything other than Windows can be sketchy) and market-penetration (virtually everyone already has a Flash plugin, and they wanted to avoid prompting theirs users to install a Silverlight plugin if Flash would accomplish essentially the same task in the end, but be easier for their users).

I do agree with you that Silverlight is a lot easier to work with than Flex though. FlexBuilder, for all its amazing widgetry, is just a pain to work with compared to VS. At least both have decent debuggers though.

[Frak]

Usually their concerns are about cross-OS support (let's face it: Silverlight on anything other than Windows can be sketchy)

The Mac OS X port works 100% just as well as the Windows native version. Plus, Silverlight doesn't rob the system of resources like Flash does on Mac. The only market you're missing is Linux, and that's only a 1% loss. You hit around 98%-99%.

A good test to see how Silverlight runs is to go here (http://dobbschallenge2.com/).

Also, I've heard that people like the install of Silverlight since it goes through ActiveX on IE and goes straight to download on anything else. There is no redirect, and the page works instantly after the plugin completes installing without restarting the browser altogether.

[Tibuda]

Or you could redirect them to message telling them they use a lame browser and should upgrade.

Google, Twitter or YouTube got enough power to do this, but a small company would lose sales. No, better to support IE6.

[Frak]

Google, Twitter or YouTube got enough power to do this, but a small company would lose sales. No, better to support IE6.
Agreed.

If you can't possibly support it under your umbrella, RIA is the next best option.

[ve4cib]

The Mac OS X port works 100% just as well as the Windows native version. Plus, Silverlight doesn't rob the system of resources like Flash does on Mac. The only market you're missing is Linux, and that's only a 1% loss. You hit around 98%-99%.

Good to know they've improved over the last few months. The last time we were dealing with Flex and/or Silverlight was several months ago, when the latest version of Sliverlight was brand-new. After some quick research the general opionions at the time seemed to indicate that it wasn't ready for anything other than Windows just yet. Apparently the situation has changed recently.

I've still got my fingers crossed that by the time HTML5 actually gets finished that it will be able to put the final nail in the coffins of both Flash and Silverlight. At the very least maybe we can get rid of Flash for non-interactive multimedia content (like videos and music). I doubt it will happen, but I remain unrealistically optimistic.

[Frak]

I've still got my fingers crossed that by the time HTML5 actually gets finished that it will be able to put the final nail in the coffins of both Flash and Silverlight. At the very least maybe we can get rid of Flash for non-interactive multimedia content (like videos and music). I doubt it will happen, but I remain unrealistically optimistic.

Computers are getting faster every day, and the needs of a website are becoming more demanding. I feel, and I have for a long time, that the way we have been treating the web is about to change. The new HTML specification looks great, it really does, but it doesn't solve many problems with how the web works. In the end, RIAs built with Flex and Silverlight become a quicker, more robust solution. They will always look and act the same regardless of the system being used. There isn't a need to worry about the vendor specific implementation coming into question.

[NoaHall]

Or you could redirect them to message telling them they use a lame browser and should upgrade.

Yeah, great, and get fired/payed less. Good idea, let's all do that now!

[Frak]

Yeah, great, and get fired/payed less. Good idea, let's all do that now!
Agreed.

[s0l1dsnak3123]

Well for me, I started with a MacBookPro, which I bought when my only criteria for a laptop was quality and price was no issue. From there I came to love the software, the polish and the general intuitiveness of the system in general. There are some great power tools too, which allow nearly total control of the computer with just the keyboard. Of course at the end of the day it is personal preference, and I find working with Mac OS to be very productive, and a very "complete" operating system.

Of course I'm looking at things from a developer's point of view, I'm not sure how to explain why Macs are so popular with designers, I guess only a designer would be able to answer that.


Ah, I see now, thanks :)




I don't really have any specific brilliant tutorial that I can think of, if you're familiar with Subversion already, the Git-SVN crash course could be a place to start:
http://git-scm.com/course/svn.html


Thanks, I'll read that tomorrow - I am already quite comfortable with svn.



I have a diagram that I found somewhere saved at work, which shows the basic Git workflow and is a good quick reference, I'll try and find it tomorrow at work.


Awesome, it would be much appreciated :)

[JUSTINBEAIRD]

I Just set up ubuntu server and have been reading about
php opcode cache does ubuntu have one already built in or what one do you recommend?

[BoGs]

Sorry to bring this topic from the dead but I do not agree with you .... you can commit to your local repositories as you make changes and when you get home you can just push all your changes to the central server (remote git repository) I recently switched from svn to git and I could not be happier... easier to setup and much MUCH MUCH faster :)


Last time I checked, GIT couldn't check in over HTTPS, unlike SVN. Being able to checkin over HTTPS means that you can work from anywhere, even behind restrictive firewalls without messing with SSH tunnels or a VPN. Also, from my experiences, the whole `distributed' model does not work well for managing web servers, which are, by design, centralised.