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Onion's Web Development Arsenal - Things you really need.

Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 5:46 pm
by onion2k
I'm sort of writing a new article listing all the things I use, or should use, to write awesome websites. If you fancy adding to the list then please do, it'd help.

Applications -

PHP - I think we all know what this is.
MySQL - And this.
Apache - My personal choice of web server mainly because I understand htaccess.
Subversion - Source code control.

Libraries -

Swiftmailer - The best PHP mail sending library available bar none.
ADODB Lite - The best database abstraction layer around.
Template Lite - The best template engine.
FPDF - Awesome PDF library.
SHA256 - Hashing replacement for MD5/SHA1.
HTMLPurifier - Stop XSS attacks before they happen.
SimpleTest - Unit Testing library that'll improve your code no end.
JQuery - Javascript AJAX/effects/make stuff easier type of thing.
JPGraph - Delightful library for charts and graphs in PHP.
ExCanvas - Get <canvas> working seamlessly in IE.

Browsers -

Firefox - Best browser around.
Internet Explorer - Needed for testing because there's still people who suffer it.
Opera - Again, needed for testing.
Safari - And again.

Extensions and Plugins -

Web Developer - Absolutely critical for finding out information about the clientside things.
Firebug - Brilliant javascript console that makes AJAX so much less of a headache to debug.
YSlow - Site speed profiling plugin (needs Firebug).
NoScript - The easy way to test a site with JS and more switched off.
SearchStatus - Site search profiler, find out keyword information, page rank, Alexa rank etc.
XDebug - An awesome PHP debugger/profiler.

Useful Extras -

Trac - A web based project management/wiki/SVN client.
PHPMyAdmin - A web based MySQL client.

Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:03 pm
by RobertPaul
Some other FF extensions of interest:

Colorzilla -- Pick colors from anywhere in the FF window.
IETab -- Switch back and forth between IE and FF rendering.

I also suggest adding MooTools (JavaScript library) and htmlMimeMail (OO mail library, though I don't know how it compares to Swiftmailer) to the Libraries list.

And the link for Swiftmailer should be .org instead of .com, apparently.

[edit]And upon further inspection, Swiftmailer looks amazing. So I guess I can rescind my htmlMimeMail suggestion. ;)[/edit]

Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:26 pm
by Zoxive
Firebug, Web developer,
VI (VIM/GVIM) (I switched to this about a month ago, it was a very hard week, but wow is it the best/most powerful editor)
Mootools, i just started looking at this earlyer this week, and i seem to like it more then jquery/prototype.

Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:38 pm
by superdezign
feyd's SHA256?

I think you got everything else I use.

Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 7:51 pm
by Benjamin
Don't forget the manuals guys.

Posted: Wed Jul 25, 2007 8:11 pm
by superdezign
astions wrote:Don't forget the manuals guys.
On that note, MDC (Mozilla Developer Center) is a great resource for client-side technologies. It's like the JavaScript manual. :-D

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 3:09 am
by the_last_tamurai
onion : the link to swift mailer site is invalid .... just replace the .com with .org :)

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 3:43 am
by Oren
You forgot HTML Purifier :wink:

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 3:51 am
by Chris Corbyn
Oren wrote:You forgot HTML Purifier :wink:
I was about to say that too. That library is awesomely well written and covers far more XSS/encoding troubles than you could think of (unless you're the Ambush Commander).

I'd like to add SimpleTest too.

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 4:46 am
by onion2k
Doh. Can't believe I forgot them. Both added.

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 10:56 am
by RobertGonzalez
That is a very comprehensive list. I would like to see some graphic applications listed as most of the apps are server side, though the testing tools represent both client and server testing. But overall, that is a very comprehensive list (and includes just about all the tools that I use, so now I feel secure in my coderness).

PS Onion, can I copy that list (giving credit to you of course) in a post on my blog?

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 11:12 am
by onion2k
Feel free to copy it.

The only thing that I can think of (now I remembered JPGraph ;) ) that's missing really is a framework. I don't use them much personally though.

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 11:34 am
by RobertGonzalez
Me either, though I am feverishly hacking a copy of Paul M Jones' Solar framework. That thing is freaking cool.

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 5:27 pm
by alex.barylski
Subversion?

Posted: Thu Jul 26, 2007 6:18 pm
by RobertGonzalez
My blog will show the post tomorrow morning at 7:00 AM pacific time.