Looking to get serious about building a website? Here are the 7 absolutely essential tools you need for web development and building your site’s front end.
Creating, debugging and managing your code
Code Editor is where you’ll create and edit source code, some good examples include VIM, ATOM and Sublime text. Look for a speedy interface – and one with good shortcuts!
Chrome Developer Tools is a set of debugging tools built into Chrome. They allow you to debug your Javascript, edit HTML and CSS in real time. It’s available in both Safari and Chrome and will give you a performance analysis of your site.
Git and GITHUB. Git is a version control system where you can store manual code. Since you’ll be changing your code often, GIT tracks these changes and allows you to reverse them if necessary. Github is a cloud interface for Git that has bug tracking, task management and project wikis.
Tools to simplify your web development coding
jQuery is a cross platform Javascript library that simplifies the frontend process. It takes common tasks and simplifies them by taking multiple lines of JavaScript and turning it into a single line of code. It streamlines your work with JavaScript.
Frontend frameworks let you cut down the amount of code and time needed to build your projects. So instead of writing the same lines of code for every new project, you can just pick out ready made elements from the framework. Some include Bootstrap and Foundation and UIKit.
CSS Preprocessor is a timesaving tool that will help you write maintainable, future-proof code, while reducing the amount of CSS you need to write, so it keeps it DRY. Sass is a common tool, it uses variables, nesting and mixins. It makes writing CSS easier and less repetitive.
Creating interactive user interfaces
React- JavaScript library that is used to build interactive user interfaces. It’s component based so every element is a separate component, like a building block. Components can be changed at any time without affecting the rest of the application.
These tools will set you up to create an incredible app or website. So start creating!
Questions about web development for discussion on Ohlelo:
- Have you ever used these suggested tools? Which brands would you recommend for novice creators?
- Was any tool or tip left out that you think is a must for frontend development?
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