There are dozens of code editors to choose from and many are freeware or open source. Ultimately, the choice is yours, whether it’s Windows Notepad, VIM or VisualStudio. However, there are a number of key IDE features that I’d recommend to all web developers.

Essential Features

An editor won’t remain on my PC if it doesn’t provide the following:

Speed and stability
The editor must start quickly and remain responsive. Sorry Eclipse and Aptana.

Multiple files / MDI interface
The days of opening a single source file are long gone. Tabs are my preferred choice of interface and they absolutely must support middle-click closing!

Multiple language support
Even the most basic web projects require HTML and CSS. A simple application is likely to add JavaScript, SQL, XML, and a server-side development language such as PHP, C#, VB, Java, Perl, Ruby or Python. Your editor should be able to effortlessly handle every type of code you choose.

Line wrapping and numbering
It may be bad practice, but long lines of code are sometimes necessary. The editor should let you view code without horizontal scrolling, so a line wrapping option is essential. When the inevitable error occurs at line 4321, you need to be able to find that bug quickly — so forget any editor that does not display line numbers.

Configurable color-coding
Missing quotes or tags can cause havoc, but color-coding can dramatically reduce your error rate. Bonus points are awarded for any editor offering fully-customizable color schemes.

Auto-complete
Microsoft VisualStudio sets the gold standard with IntelliSense. Few editors reach that level, but if I’m adding a <p> tag, you can guarantee I want a closing </p>. Please don’t make me type it!

Session store and restore
When the editor is restarted, it should restore the files you were working on, open them in the correct order and preferably at the last line you were editing.

File explorer
The option to open other files in the current project can save time.

Find and replace across files
How many times have you renamed a class or function? The editor should provide facilities to change all references quickly and easily.

Desirable Features

The following options are great if they’re available:

Debugging tools
Debugging facilities range from absolutely essential (.NET or Java), to useful (PHP or Perl), to unnecessary (JavaScript — unless it’s better than Firebug!) Make sure your editor provides the debugging tools you need.

Bookmarking
Jumping between functions in the same file is easier if you can bookmark individual lines.

Multiple views
Similarly, it can be useful to ’split’ a file into multiple windows so different segments can be edited at the same time.

Code-folding
The facility to collapse or expand segments allows you to concentrate on the important code.

Code explorer
Again, VisualStudio sets the standard with class inspection windows showing details of all properties and methods. However, a simple list of method/function names in alphabetical or source order can be just as useful. Bonus points for any editor which handles the multiple types of function declaration in JavaScript!

Good font support
In general, I prefer to code using a proportional font. I may be in the minority, but please don’t force me to use monospace! SciTE offers the best solution; you can switch between monospaced and proportional fonts using Ctrl+F11.

Shortcuts, plugins, and macros
If you use particular keyboard combinations or functionality, configurable shortcuts, macros and plugins can help you migrate to another editor.

And the Bad Features…

Sometimes, editors offer dubious functionality that you really do not need.

WYSIWYG design view
Whilst WYSIWYG can be useful for novice developers, you will soon discover that hand-coding HTML and CSS is quicker than any design package. It can also be essential if your application requires DOM manipulation. If a WYSIWYG view is provided, make sure it doesn’t refactor your carefully-crafted code when you accidentally hit the ‘design’ button.

Obtrusive project management
Sometimes, you just need to open a file and make a minor change — please don’t force us to create a new project!

Dumb HTML-generation tools
I do not need a toolbar icon that uses valuable screen estate and inserts a <p> tag. And I certainly don’t need icons that insist on adding deprecated <b> tags!

What are the essential features you look for in a code editor? Are there any “features” that particularly annoy you?

With the recent release of Firefox 3.5, we’re very pleased to announce the release of updates to our useful developer tools: Dust-Me Selectors, and CodeBurner for Firebug.

Dust-Me Selectors is a standalone extension that finds unused CSS selectors, and is particularly useful for updating legacy sites, allowing you to throw away all those redundant rules without worrying that something, somewhere might be using them.

CodeBurner for Firebug, as its name suggests, is an extension to the popular developer tool, Firebug, and extends it with searchable reference material for HTML and CSS.

We’ve been beavering away behind the scenes on updates to both these extensions, waiting for the final version of Firefox 3.5 — and now that it’s been released, here they are!

Dust-Me Selectors in particular benefits from this browser update — thanks to improvements in Firefox’s JavaScript engine, it now performs significantly faster, with a typical "find…" operation around 50% quicker than in Firefox 3.0!

But that’s not nearly all! Both new versions also bring a host of improvements and new features:

New features in Dust-Me Selectors Version 2.2:

• new tabbed preferences dialog that’s neater and more user-friendly
• added a new spidering preference "don’t spider external sites", which resricts the spider to pages on the same domain as the sitemap
• bugfixes to make "find…" and "spider…" keyboard triggers more reliable cross-platform
• improved error handling throughout
• removed two unecessary preferences to streamline the spidering logic: "ignore www difference" and "ignore fragment identifiers" in URLs, both of which are now enabled all the time

New features in CodeBurner for Firebug 1.2:

• improved search algorithm gives better results
• special search now includes "other attributes that are valid for this element" as well as those which are actually defined for it
• code examples for CSS properties now include direct links to live examples online
• the original search term is now indicated in search results
• slightly modified license clarifies the distinction between "use" and "redistribution"

Both of these updates have been uploaded to the Mozilla Add-ons site, however since all submissions are reviewed manually, it may be a day or so before they become available from there, or through the automatic updates channel. So if you can’t wait that long, you can grab them straight away from SitePoint:

• Dust-Me Selectors v2.2
• CodeBurner for Firebug v1.2

As always, we welcome your comments and feedback on both of these extensions — and if you’ve any ideas for features you’d like to see, please don’t hesitate to let us know!

1. Fewer than 8% of people know what a browser is. Many confuse it with a search engine or a company.
2. The majority of users do not know or care which browser they’re using. It’s simply an icon they click to access the web.
3. Hardly anyone had heard of Chrome.

Chrome, the Google-branded web browser, has been available since September 2008. It’s known for its clean, minimalistic interface, quick rendering speed, anonymous browsing facilities, and high stability. Each tab is handled by a separate process, so a single page crash does not bring down the whole application.

It’s undoubtedly a great browser and has gained a 2 - 5% market share within its first year. However, it’s difficult to determine how many non-technical users have been attracted to Chrome. Web developers certainly use it, but Google’s survey suggests that it’s yet to achieve mainstream awareness.

Google — if you’re listening — here are my suggestions to increase Chrome’s adoption rate.

1. Change the name
“Chrome” is a clever and geeky name, but it means absolutely nothing to most people. I suspect few people in the IT industry understand the significance. Google has a history of naming applications after their function (docs, maps, email, etc.), and their browser should be no exception, e.g.

• Google Internet
• Google Web
• G-Internet
• or even just “Google” since that’s the first page most users open.

2. Get it on user desktops
The vast majority of users will only use Chrome if it’s already installed for them. Google should therefore:

1. Do deals with PC manufacturers and software producers.
2. Offer Chrome as an optional extra with related software, such as Google Desktop.
3. Promote the browser on Google-owned websites. A Chrome download link is already shown for IE6/7 visitors to Google.com (not IE5/5.5 though?), so the program could be extended to sites such as YouTube. Google needs to be careful with heavy-handed advertising, but a single opt-out click could apply across every site.

3. Keep the browser simple
Let’s cut the pretense. Google has one primary objective: to beat Microsoft and Internet Explorer. Many users have no reason to switch from IE, so Google should concentrate on persuading them that Chrome is easy to install, simpler, and faster to use. Security and stability are a bonus but, since so few IE users knowingly experience problems, those factors should not be part of the main marketing message.

I’m not against Google improving the browser with features such as add-ons, but most users will never care about or use those facilities. If an option results in additional complexity (even an extra menu item), Google should seriously reconsider its implementation.

Developers and power users already have Firefox and Opera so matching the feature sets found in those browsers may convert a proportion of IT-literate users. However, perhaps it would be better if Google targeted Chrome at the 92% of people who do not know what a browser is.

See also: What is a Web Browser? No One Knows!

Do you have any other ideas? Can Google persuade people to drop IE? Will Chrome just take market share from other browsers?

Sure, $795 is a bargain for two days of presentations by some of the most inspiring people on the Web (statement made based on personal experience). But it gets better — if you use the discount code SITEPOINT when you register, then you’ll receive an additional $45 off the ticket price, taking the cost down to AUD $750. If you’ve been waiting on approval from your boss, telling them about this extra discount might be all the incentive to get him or her across the line. And if you’re paying your own way, then this extra saving will no doubt be appreciated!

Here’s the kicker: you don’t actually have to pay for your ticket yet! You just have to register to attend, and can sort out payment for your ticket at a later date.

However, this offer is only good for two weeks, so be sure to act quickly!

So Why Should You Attend?

This year is looking like it will be bigger and better than ever. Personally I’m pretty excited about the fact that so many SitePoint authors are on the lineup to speak, but there are also some great new faces stepping up to talk about a range of exciting topics that will appeal to web professionals, regardless of whether you’re a designer, a developer or business-minded. Here’s just a sampling of some of the great speakers presenting at Web Directions South:

• SitePoint’s own Technical Director and best-selling author, Kevin Yank, talking about CSS Frameworks
• Author of Sexy Web Design, Elliot Jay Stocks, talking about progressive enhancement
• Author of several SitePoint books, Cameron Adams, talking about his experience designing the interface for Google Wave
• Author of the upcoming jQuery: Novice to Ninja, Earle Castledine

That’s just the tip of the iceberg — check out the full speaker list for more details.

Remember this low pricing is only available until July 9, so make sure you don’t miss out. Hope to see you there!

Read SitePoint coverage of past Web Directions conferences:

• Andy Budd on Usability, Design, and the Death of CSS
• IE and Standards: Chris Wilson Talks
• Comic Book Inspiration and the CSS Eleven

Disclaimer: SitePoint is a proud media partner of Web Directions South.

Imagine developing an app where you don’t have to worry about the constraints of cross-browser compatibility! Imagine being free to style not only the contents inside the window, but the window itself! Imagine all the people … (oops, apologies to John Lennon!)

You can probably tell that I’m pretty excited about our latest article. It’s called “Take Your CSS to the Desktop With Adobe AIR,” and was written by SitePoint’s own Andrew Tetlaw (author of the Tech Times). In it, he shows you how to create your own living, breathing desktop app. In fact, it’s an app that some of you might even find useful—a desktop app for receiving notifications from Flippa, the newly launched marketplace for buying and selling web sites.

Building this app was Andrew’s first foray into developing with AIR, and according to him it was an eye-opening experience and actually quite easy to do.

If you’re also new to developing with Adobe AIR, then be sure to take the quiz at the end of the tutorial to see how much new knowledge you’ve absorbed. You might even win a prize! In partnership with Adobe, we’re giving away a print copy of Getting Started With Adobe Flex 3 to the first 100 people to complete the quiz. But you’d better get in quick—it’s first come, first served, and the last time we gave copies of this book they were snapped up in no time.

Having this handbook in your library is an asset if you want to be able to build applications of any magnitude for the Adobe Flash Platform; from simple widgets to complicated, multi featured RIAs. The article is just the tip of the iceberg for what is possible.

Read the article and take the quiz now … then start building some funky desktop apps!

Fewer than 8% of people knew. Most confused it with a search engine, and the majority did not appear to know which browser they used. More worrying for Google was that no one had heard of Chrome…

That’s a little scary. Perhaps Google’s survey was performed on a bad day? Unfortunately, I’ve a horrible feeling that the figures would be similar no matter where you asked the question (except for Finland, which appears to have a disproportionately high percentage of technically-literate people!).

This leaves web developers with a problem. Whilst we may be passionate about our browser of choice, the vast majority of non-geeks in the real world use whatever browser is on their PC. Most people will only switch if a techie-friend does it for them — and I bet they don’t notice any significant differences.

How can we encourage the adoption of newer and better technology if no one knows what we’re talking about? I suspect many of the ‘kill IE6′ campaigns have a negligible effect, and ignorance must be partially responsible for the slow and lingering death of the browser.

How do you explain what a ‘web browser’ is to the 92% of people who do not know or care?

The rate of decline of visitors to sitepoint.com who are using Internet Explorer has not slowed. Using the same linear approach, the latest stats still suggest that IE will have disappeared from sitepoint.com by 2013 …

But wait—let me add to that prediction.

With the current growth in users of Chrome, more people will visit sitepoint.com using Chrome than IE by 2011.

Let me answer some questions that will no doubt arise.

Linear Analysis: Yes, there are better mathematical approaches. Regression analysis would be more accurate; however, it’s more complex and time-consuming. All I want to illustrate is a continuing trend, so a simple, quick analysis should suffice for what I’m trying to show.

For those interested, a linear equation is a straight line using the least squares method. Its weakness is that it only accepts one variable and ignores other factors that may influence the result. Regression analysis on the other hand, can cater for numerous variables, both dependent and independent.

sitepoint.com traffic: We have an early-adopting, technical audience, and that means our browser stats are no true reflection of the general Web. That said, it’s easy to underestimate the influence the tech crowd has over browser usage.

If you’re a site owner, I’d love to hear if you’re experiencing a similar reduction of IE users on your own site.

Did you find out what was new and cool in Flex 4? Just over a week ago we published a new article about the Adobe Flex framework which included an Adobe-sponsored competition to win a copy of Flex Builder (and a free upgrade to Flash Builder 4 when it is released).

We had three of these prizes to give away and you only had a seven-day window to enter. Well done to those readers who wasted no time answering the questions to get their names on the list! For those who missed out, keep an eye out in the blogs and forums for your next opportunity (which isn’t too far away … watch this space!)

A huge thank you to Adobe for providing these prizes.

And now, to the winners! On this occasion, the lucky readers are …

(drum roll please)

• Joseph Sims, USA
• Curt Tweedle, Canada
• Wayne McManus, England

Curt is a graphic designer and web developer who is just starting to develop web apps and says he’s really looking forward to it. Curt commented:

Thank you SitePoint for all the great articles over the years.

It’s our pleasure, Curt!

Wayne is a 32-year old client-side developer, and what he loves about SitePoint is:

The range of great tutorials in technology I currently use or plan to use in the near future. I’m looking forward to learning Flash Builder 4 in-depth!

We’d better send his prize express post then!

Congratulations to all three of you!

Like I said, if you missed out this time, don’t worry — there will be future opportunities to win other great prizes, so keep an eye out on this very blog for more details.

Oh, and don’t forget: if you’re interested in furthering your Flex skills, you can still read the article to get up to speed on Flex 4, and test how much you understood by taking the quiz.

• Read the article: http://www.sitepoint.com/article/whats-new-flex-4/
• Take the quiz: http://www.sitepoint.com/quiz/adobe/whats-new-flex-4/
• Read more Flex articles on SitePoint: http://www.sitepoint.com/subcat/flex

Craig Buckler: Firefox add-ons is possibly the most successful extensions system ever devised. A huge community has developed over 12,000 add-ons, so why is there a need for Jetpack?

Nick Nguyen: As you mentioned, our add-ons platform is incredibly successful. Having said that, there have been a number of areas of improvement that the add-ons community has identified including ease of development, the lack of tools, and the difficulty of debugging that we felt we could explore with Jetpack.

The vision of Jetpack is to expand the population of add-on developers to include any web developer with an idea — hence the emphasis on Web technologies.

CB: Do you see Jetpack as a replacement or an alternative to XUL-based extensions?

NN: Just as Ubiquity has been embraced by the Mozilla community, Jetpack is an experimental platform which will be driven by members of the community as well as Mozilla Labs. Because we’re trying things that haven’t been done before, we expect some things to be successful and other things to need revisions. This is much easier and safer to do on a new experimental platform than it is on the existing one, so we’ll continue to evolve both Jetpack and XUL based extensions.

We view Jetpack as complementary to the existing platform — some things we learn from Jetpack may migrate into the existing platform or Jetpack may continue to evolve as a separate path to rapid extension development.

CB: Is there any risk of confusing or fragmenting add-on developers and users?

NN: There is always the possibility of confusion, but communication with our community is important to us. We’ve tried to make it clear that Jetpack is not a wholesale replacement of the current system and we will continue to do so.

CB: The current Jetpack API provides access to browser tabs, notifications, and the status bar. Will it eventually provide full access to the chrome interface like XUL?

NN: We’re reaching out to the community and doing some of our own thinking on which UI elements to open to Jetpack. There is a necessary balance between ease of development and platform flexibility that we’re exploring. The goal is to get Jetpack to a point where it exposes enough functionality to implement a large percentage of Firefox extensions, thus giving developers the flexibility to build their ideas.

CB: You plan to include external API libraries for systems such as Twitter, Delicious, and Google Maps. What is your selection criteria and can any site developer request inclusion?

NN: We’ve tried to identify a set of commonly used libraries, but we do want to get to the point where any Javascript library can be easily referenced and included in a Jetpack extension.

CB: Extensions could introduce malicious browser code. How will Jetpack address security concerns?

NN: Security in Jetpack is aspirational in the current early stage of development. We want to explore the intrinsic ways the platform can improve security through architecture. For instance, we want to maximize code reuse through the use of libraries and limit the amount of bespoke extension code to the lowest number of lines. We feel that at a minimum this makes code review much easier, and opens opportunities to programmatically understand the level of access an extension requires to function. How that information is exposed to users and reviewers is another open question we plan to answer as the platform evolves.

CB: Will Mozilla provide a Jetpack repository that allows users to search for extensions?

NN: Just as addons.mozilla.org helps extension developers with distribution and metrics for their add-ons, we will soon launch a gallery which will do the same for Jetpack developers. How this will look and what it will be called is still to be determined.

CB: Firefox updates can break existing add-ons or require the developer to update their code. What can Jetpack do to alleviate the problem?

NN: Since Jetpack provides an abstraction layer between add-ons and the underlying browser code, maintaining compatibility across browser versions becomes a matter of updating the core platform rather than individual extensions.

CB: Firefox add-ons are often blamed for making the browser slow. Are you addressing that issue in Jetpack?

NN: Poor Add-on performance is often the result of implementations that aren’t made with the benefit of deep knowledge of the Firefox platform. This is partly due to the flexibility and “bare metal” nature of the current extension development.

By promoting code reuse and an abstraction layer, thus removing the burden of requiring this knowledge, we can more easily improve Jetpack performance for all extensions by improving the performance of the underlying platform.

CB: Jetpack is currently an add-on itself. Will it eventually be integrated into Firefox?

NN: Jetpack is an experiment. Aspects of Jetpack may become part of the core platform or Jetpack may evolve along a separate path. It is too early to know for sure — as with all things we do at Mozilla, the community’s involvement and feedback will help drive that decision.

CB: Will Jetpack find its way into other Mozilla projects, such as Fennec (mobile browser) or Thunderbird?

NN: Definitely possible, but too early to tell. Many aspects of Firefox extension development apply equally across Mozilla products, and approaching Jetpack with the goal of improving Firefox add-on development will result in learning about how to improve Add-ons for all Mozilla products.

CB: Jetpack extensions could become cross-browser compatible. Have any other browser vendors shown interest in the project?

NN: Yes, and we’re pleased to see that extension development has generated such interest in the browser world. As for specifics, I’ll leave it to the other vendors to disclose their interest.

CB: The Jetpack team are asking for developer participation. How has the response and feedback been so far?

NN: Response has been great. We’re seeing active participation in the Jetpack discussion group and we plan on continuing to grow that community as we build in more capability to the platform.

CB: When did work on Jetpack commence and is a final release date scheduled?

NN: Jetpack was inspired by community feedback as well as projects like FUEL which had similar goals of improving the developer experience. Actual brainstorming and implementation started early in 2009, but we have no final release date. We will release at an experimental pace and cadence until the community feels like we’re close to the finish line.

CB: Thanks Nick. Best of luck with the Jetpack project.

See also:

• Mozilla Jetpack: Firefox Extensions with Added Thrust
• Nick Nguyen Bio

Have you tried Jetpack? Is it the future for the Firefox add-ons system?

No, it’s not another cheap iPod Touch knockoff, but this really nifty iPhone Stencil Kit from Design Commission.

iPhone interface design is über-cool at the moment, as is hand sketching your UI mockups, and this little tool lets you tick both those boxes at the same time. Everything is scaled up by about a third to make it easier to work with and includes a variety of generic iPhone UI elements including media controls, browser widgets, buttons, sliders and more.

Even if you don’t happen to be commonly designing for iPhone, I could see this item looking pretty tasty next to a brushed aluminum MacBook as a piece of quality desk ephemera. And don’t we all need more of that?

Cheers Wendy for the heads-up.