Simplifying Web Development: Essential Chrome Extensions for Developers

Web developers often rely on browser extensions to streamline workflows, boost productivity, and access valuable tools. Chrome extensions are small software programs that customize the browsing experience. They are built on web technologies such as HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. A single extension brings multiple components and a range of functionality. There have many extensions available for web designer and developer that can help them in their development process. Google Chrome also extended its support for developers by providing customized and integrated extensions. Let's explore a selection of essential Chrome extensions designed to make a web developer's life easier.

1. Web Developer

Web Developer is a versatile tool with various functionalities, including disabling JavaScript, examining cookies, outlining page elements, and much more, aiding in debugging and testing.

2. Wappalyzer

Wappalyzer is a handy tool that identifies the technologies used on a website. It helps developers understand the tech stack behind any webpage, including frameworks, CMS, analytics tools, and more.

3. Lighthouse

Lighthouse, a Google-developed extension, performs audits on web pages, providing insights into performance, accessibility, SEO, and best practices. It offers suggestions to enhance site performance.

4. CSS Peeper

CSS Peeper allows developers to inspect styles, gradients, fonts, and measurements on any webpage. It's an excellent resource for gathering design insights and extracting CSS code.

5. ColorZilla

ColorZilla is a robust color picker tool that assists developers in identifying colors from web pages. It aids in creating and editing color palettes directly within the browser.

6. JSON View

JSON View is an extension for printing JSON and JSONP. You can configure to your liking. It includes collapsible nodes, clickable URLs, a Scratchpad, 27 built-in themes. You can type/paste JSON and format by using a button or key shortcut. This cool extension will allow you to open and view the JSON data of every web page where you work. You can see complete JSON code with Just one click without affecting the source code.

7. WhatFont

8. Refined GitHub

Refind GitHub simplifies the default GitHub interface and adds all sorts of extra features such as marking issues and pull requests as unread, linking branch references in pull requests, adding a quick edit button to the readme, adding blame links for parent commits in blame view, and much more.

9. Usersnap

Usersnap extension will streamline the collaboration process as it creates screenshots of the current content. This extension will help you to collaborate with multiple people on your web projects on a daily basis. You can communicate more efficiently on various issues and share feedback between other developers, customers, and anyone else involved in a web project.

10. Marmoset

Marmoset extension will help you to take your code and output snapshots for your demos and mockups. You can also able to add themes and effects to create images for promo and your online portfolio.

11. Check My Links

Check My Links can quickly find all the links on a web page, and check each one for you. It highlights valid links in green and the broken ones in red. It will also publish full URLs of broken links in the Console log.

12. UX Check

UX Check helps you identify possible usability issues on a web page. It works by reviewing a web page and highlighting certain aspects that need to be improved. These reviews can be exported into a document that can be easily shared or reviewed.

13. Dimensions

Dimensions is an excellent tool for measuring distances between elements on a page. It works by calculating the space from your pointer or selection either up/down or left/right until it hits a border. This extension is great for regression testing or making sure the implemented markup matches the design specifications.

14. CSS Shapes Editor

CSS Shapes Editor provides a way to edit any CSS shape using an interactive editor that overlaps the selected element. It offers controls to create and edit CSS Shapes values like polygon(), circle() and ellipse() on the selected element. It allows you to see the changes in real-time as you edit, without affecting the rest of the elements.

15. Window Resizer

The huge differences in browser resolutions can also become a problem when you’re a designer or developer. Through the Window Resizer, you can test your layout on different resolutions straight from your Google Chrome. It gives you an entire list of different resolutions, and you have the capacity to add and delete resolutions as well as reorder the list. It even gives you customizable global key shortcuts and lets you use your personal settings on a different computer.

16. ColorPick Eyedropper

By using ColorPick Eyedropper, you can click on any part of the page you see online and get the color values of the specific shade or tint you need. It definitely saves you from the hassle of having to go through color charts just to find the right hue that corresponds to the color you saw online.

17. HTML Validator

HTML Validator is a Chrome extension that helps you validate HTML elements. It works by inspecting a web page’s markup and highlights the errors and violations found.

18. Validity

Validity is a tool for checking webpage markup validity. It helps in identifying and fixing HTML and CSS issues, ensuring code compliance with web standards.

Conclusion

Chrome extensions serve as invaluable aids for web developers, offering a plethora of tools and functionalities to streamline tasks, inspect web elements, debug code, optimize performance, and enhance productivity. Incorporating these extensions into their toolkit can significantly improve a developer's efficiency and effectiveness in the realm of web development.