Building Your Application
Whether it is standard HTML or dynamic code like PHP or ASP.NET, you need a good editor to put it all together. I have used a number of editors over the years, and the one I like and use daily is WebMatrix. The latest version is a free download and has everything you need to build prototypes and the final product. In addition, there are a variety of templates available to quickly build an application.
Although WebMatrix is a Microsoft offering, you are not restricted to Microsoft technologies, as it can be used for PHP-based applications and those using HTML/CSS/JavaScript standards.
Since Microsoft doesn’t have the best reputation in the web development community, you can also explore other options, starting with Dreamweaver, Brackets, or a cloud-based tool such as Cloud9.
Browser Tools
The latest version of Firefox offers some great tools. With a few clicks, you can easily access the JavaScript console and developer tools. The tools allow you to dig into every detail of a web page and its code: JavaScript, HTML DOM, CSS classes and elements, etc.
A Good Foundation
There are freely available frameworks that provide the foundation for your own application; these frameworks utilize the latest techniques for full-featured web applications. A good one is Bootstrap, and the latest version fully embraces responsive design and the mobile platform – the motto of Bootstrap 3 is mobile first.
Plenty of Options
There are numerous other tools you might want to check out; Proto.io for quickly creating prototypes, PhoneGap for mobile development, BrowserStack for testing, and free JavaScript libraries such a Modernizr and Chart.js.
The key is to find good tools and know how to use them; this allows you to focus on tackling your new project as opposed to figuring out how to use the tools.
