A few MUST-HAVES for EVERY webmaster!

Johnny · #1 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 01:33 PM

Let me start by proclaiming my admiration of Mozilla's Firefox. My love for this browser is borderline creepy, but alas, I am not ashamed. My deep relationship with this Foxy (pun intended, sorry) program has only grown and flourished with time. I take and take and it just keeps giving. I guess you could kind of call it love...

ha, in all seriousness though...

Firefox 3 is freakin' awesome! If any of you haven't downloaded it yet, stop what you're doing, don't pass go, don't collect any money, and immediately go to Mozilla.com and download it.

Now on to the real point of this post (finally, I know!)...

If you are lucky enough to already have FF3, you'd be crazy not to utilize the following extensions:

1) first and foremost, the Web Developer Toolbar. I honestly can't believe that it's free. That's how good it is. I cannot begin to list all the amazingly helpful tools included with it... there are seriously THAT many. I am not at all exaggerating by saying that it has cut the time it takes me to design a site in half, if not more. I don't know how I worked without it.

2) For anyone who uses lots of CSS, the "Stylish" extension is a godsend. It allows you to quickly (and I mean QUICKLY) test out your custom CSS without having to actually go into your files and manually modify your style sheets.

example: say you're changing your site background, and you have a few ideas, but aren't sure which one will look best. Instead of tediously opening, editing, and saving your style-file (ha, that rhymes ), you simply open up this handy extension and test your heart out... no harm, no foul. I guarantee it will make the job 90% faster.

3) Finally, Fireshot. If you've ever needed a quick, easy screenshot of your site (or any site, really), this is by far the best way to go. You can pick between just the visible area or the entire page. You can either save the shot as is, or copy it to your clipboard and edit it further with any imaging program you wish.

There are countless other great extensions for FF, but these three are the absolute necessities. If you already have them, kudos. If not, head to addons.mozilla.com and pimp-out your Firefox!

I promise your life will be 10x easier... well, maybe just the webmaster part of your life

Trust me on this one, and I welcome all your "thank-you" letters!

bigtunafan · #2 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 03:20 PM

I will agree I love firefox too. However, I have purposely not downloaded FF3 because I wanted to wait until all the bugs are worked out. Do you know if it is stable enough to download and still use ALL the extensions?

Johnny · #3 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 03:35 PM

Big Tuna,

The stable version of FF3 was released about a week ago.

I've had the beta version for almost three months now and to tell you the truth, I never experienced a problem, even with the beta. I upgraded to the official release the day it came out and I can't say one negative thing about it.

When I went from FF2 to FF3Beta, out of my twenty or so extensions only 1 (StumbleUpon Toolbar) didn't work at first... but a patch came out less than a week later. The transition was pretty seamless actually.

Just give it a try... you'll never want to see FF2 again. FF3 is leaps and bounds above it.

happy downloading my man!

lisa · #4 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 03:58 PM

I agree Johnny, that Web Development toolbar is pretty sweet. Gotta love Firefox. I'll have to try Fireshot. I've never heard of it.

Kerry · #5 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 05:31 PM

I downloaded FF3 and so far I love it...
Just grabbed some add-ons as well, so I'll test em' out and let you all know

TechieGuy · #6 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 07:18 PM

Thanks Johnny. I have used the Web Developer toolbar in the past and I thought it was great. I'll give the other two a try.

lisa · #7 (**permalink**) 07-01-2008, 11:40 PM

Right now the ColorZilla plugin is my fave. I would always have to open PhotoShop to get the hex values. It's so nice to be able to use my browser and get the code in a snap! FireFTP is also another fave of mine.

I think I've learned about most plugins I use from the people on this forum. Thanks everyone!

Johnny · #8 (**permalink**) 07-02-2008, 12:47 AM

Lisa,

I've heard a few people speak highly of ColorZilla, so I 'reckon I'll give it a try. I've been using the Developer Toolbar for my hex-fetching needs ("View Color Information" under the "Information" icon, to be exact), and it's never let me down.

Nothing wrong with broadening my spectrum (once again, pun totally intended) though! I'll let ya' know what I think