Yesterday I visited the local Software Freedom Day event here in Dundee, and I was impressed with what was available. I think that the whole web industry is moving towards open source software, and went along to see what things were on offer. We all know that the biggest and most common instance of open source software within the internet industry is Mozilla Firefox, but there is so much other items of software available.
It was interesting to see the wide range of software packages available, which ranged from graphics packages to office software and everything in between. The most interesting outcome of the day for me was when I received a Linux Ubuntu disk, as I’ve very little experience of that particular operating system. I’ve seen people use it and have obviously read about it over the years but I’ve little personal experience. One technique I picked up was to install it using a Virtual Box, which enables the new system to be installed on a machine virtually so that it doesn’t affect the original operating system. This seems like a good way of trying out Linux knowing that I can always revert back without too much risk.
What do the current Linux users think? Should I jump over from Windows?
It is now over seven years since the 6th version of Microsoft’s Web Browser was launched, and it is still popular today for some reason, although this is mainly with large organisations and some education centres. With the recent release of Firefox 3 it is plain to see how far browsers have progressed in the past seven years, and with Google now joining the party with their Chrome release there is much to be said for the browser business today.
As any web developer will know, trying to create aesthetically pleasing sites which fit into all these browsers is a challenge, with Internet Explorer 6 being the worst of the lot due to the way that it handles code and styles. As a beginner, I’ve had little experience of altering a site specifically in order to suit Internet Explorer 6 (lucky me!). Large organisations are often the last to change software due to perceived security issues but I feel that the time has come for us to help them along by refusing to cater for IE 6 users anymore, and if the majority of developers do likewise then slowly but surely Internet Explorer 6′s market share will begin to drop completely.
With the recent release of Firefox 3, and in response to Sharon’s post I thought it would be a good idea to include a list of what I feel are the best plugins available for Firefox, well according to me anyway.
I couldn’t live without this toolbar in Firefox as it can literally analyse every part of a website from the image details, CSS styling and div order. It has come in immensely handy when developing sites as it clearly outlies the different areas of the site whilst still displaying the site.
What I consider to be one of the best FTP clients available at the moment, it couldn’t be simpler to use. Local files are displayed on the left and the server files displayed on the right, with transfers executed at the click of a button. Connections are created by entering a few simple details provided by your web host and each time that connection is required it requires only a single click. I use this plugin on a daily basis to manage a number of sites and can’t find fault with it.
This is a great timesaver when registering on new forums or websites, as all your personal details are stored within this plugin and entered into the relevant fields at the touch of a button. It saves on having to re-enter the same details time and again on each new website that we register for.
Quite similar to the web development toolbar in that this allows for the display of the web pages structure such as HTML code and style attributes whilst looking at the site. One advantage that it has over the toolbar is that HTML and CSS are displayed simultaneously giving more of an overview of the page as a whole. However, I feel that it contains less features such as image manipulation and outlining capabilities of the web development toolbar.
OK, so not technically a plugin but if you’re like me and like to have your web apps all shiny and nice looking then themes are the best place to go for that! Almost any style can be applied from Mac styles to your favourite sports to retro styles. Easily downloaded and switches you could have hours of fun browsing the different themes available
