
23 Essential Tools For Web Development on a Mac - tomh
http://webjackalope.com/web-development-tools-mac/
======
sh1mmer
I wasn't impressed by this list. There were no hidden gems. Most of this stuff
is extremely basic for any Mac developer, there were also glaring holes in the
list.

Examples about how to get things like Bazaar VCS installed from Macports would
have been a lot more interesting for people I think.

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pjackson
I found this list a little contrived. These tools are not ALL essential, are
they?

No mention of source control, either. Yikes.

~~~
j2d2
I agree. I'm not convinced that many editors are essential. I only use
emacs...

It seems to be written by someone just getting into the world of development
and they're excited about it. Not particularly neat for us older hackers.

AND, phpMyAdmin is not a mac app...

~~~
pjackson
15 years ago, my CS202 professor was asked:

Q: "Dr. Anasastio, can you recommend a different editor from emacs? It's so
hard to work with. Can we use pico or jot?"

A: "No. Emacs is THE editor. If you plan to work in computer science, you have
to know it."

Though I personally use TextMate for most coding these days, I can certainly
see his point. 15 years later, emacs is still relevant and powerful (and
free).

Find me another editor you can say that about, and I'll pay you $5. (vi
doesn't count: it's only relevant because sysadmins could fit it on a floppy,
and now it's vim anyway.)

~~~
dnaquin
:%s/emacs/vim/gci

~~~
jmtulloss
Agreed.

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jonknee
> For those Mac users who think BBEdit is better than Textmate, it’s usually
> because BBEdit is a Cocoa application, and TextMate is a Unix application.

False. TextMate is a Cocoa app and BBEdit is Carbon.

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god
lol, I just see a page full of crap.

Not anymore. The page works now.

So let me put something useful here.

My list of tools:

vim

~~~
brasmusen
It's back to being a page full of crap... just symbols for me...
[http://img.skitch.com/20080820-e9u8x5grdwdqbt6dk2wdq4e74e.jp...](http://img.skitch.com/20080820-e9u8x5grdwdqbt6dk2wdq4e74e.jpg)

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snorkel
Forget MAMP. Install Vmware Fusion and run your server environment of choice
in a local virtual machine.

~~~
arthurk
I've thought about this. How do you transfer files between the host and the
guest? Do you develop in OS X, transfer the files and then run them? If yes,
isn't this a little time-consuming?

~~~
bretthoerner
You can mount your VM locally by running something like Samba on the VM side,
then open stuff normally with TextMate or whatever.

It's a bit slow and has some quirks with huge projects, so I stopped doing it,
personally. Mounting with ExpanDrive or MacFuse(SSH) were slower when I tried.

~~~
elai
Personally, I just setup an rsync share on the VM, and then run a script on my
local machine that rysnc's the project directory just checking timestamps for
changes and ignoring all scm folders. It's super quick after the initial sync,
since all your usually changing anyway per testing iteration is just a few
small text files at a time. Works great for big projects too.

Although nowadays, I'm finding the 'separate VM & host os" for development a
bit tedious. Even executing that script to see code changes vs. just saving
the file and seeing it right away is a drain on productivity. And doing remote
editing put's a noticeable lag to my editing.

~~~
neovive
Very true. Why not just setup a staging server on the VM and use MAMP and
benefit from the quick save and preview. Then sync up to your VM for staging
to test your deployment.

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axod
My list:

* an editor, source control, firebug, parallels.

23 is sort of a lot. And as for ftp???!!!?

~~~
nickb
"And as for ftp???!!!?"

Actually, Transmit's a pretty awesome little utility. It supports ssh (scp)
and more importantly, it supports AWS S3 so you can explore and modify your
buckets with it. There's a Firefox plug that does similar thing but it's
horribly buggy.

~~~
jmtulloss
But why? I don't know of anybody that deploys by copying files to their server
manually. There's always something else that needs to be done and it ends up
getting scripted away. Even the most basic deployment usually involves a copy
and telling the server to restart or refresh itself.

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Readmore
If you need 23 essential tools then you're doing something wrong. When the
article says "5 essential tools" then I'll be interested.

~~~
Zev
How's 4 tools sound instead? I could add one more, but I wouldn't consider it
"essential".

    
    
      1. Some sort of text editor that you know how to use.
      2. Some sort of versioning that you know how to use.
      3. Some sort of way to transfer files offsite that you know how to use.
      4. Some sort of way to run the code. A local copy of the server environment that you use should do.
    

I can't think of anything else that's _essential_. Some things might help make
you more productive, but you could easily continue working without the likes
of Quicksilver or Spaces.

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graywh
::sarcasm:: This blog is a goldmine of lists--just what we love on HN!

    
    
        23 Essential Tools For Web Development on a Mac
        15 Quick Ways to Shrink Page Load Times
        12 Ways to Design For the Fickle Web User

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funkdobiest
A list for those just who haven't found Eclipse and it's plugins: SQL
Explorer, Subclipse, PHPEclipse,CFEclipse, EPIC. and Firefox and it's plugins:
Web developer, Firebug, FireFTP I'm sure there are many more that I have
forgotten.

~~~
elai
PyDev Extensions for django developers!

He also forgot the scm utils, like Versions or Cornerstone. GitNub seems to be
more a GUI for GitHub than git unfortunately :(

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mattdennewitz
cocoamysql and phpmyadmin can easily be replaced by navicat or navicat lite
(free), which is available for linux, osx, and windows. ive found it pretty
handy.

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scott_s
_If you’re looking for a way to ease the pain of using the command line and
Terminal, try iTerm._

Probably not aimed at this crowd.

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senthil_rajasek
6 of the 23 apps are not free. Whats up with that?

~~~
sant0sk1
God forbid we actually pay money for apps that help us make money...

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tlrobinson
WebKit

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burp
Can't see it with ff3

