Essential ASP.NET developer's toolbox

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There are a few articles around the “ideal” toolbox to develop ASP.NET applications, however each developer has his or her own preferred tools and I thought that I would share with you my favourite tools. Here they are in no particular order:

• Microsoft Windows Vista x64, is there another operating system out there for ASP.NET developers? Yes, Microsoft Windows Server 2008 x64, but not on my laptop.
  
• Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 SP1 Professional, though any flavour will do Express (the free version) has amazed me recently particularly the fact that it runs well on a 1.6gz Atom processor with a Gig of RAM. However, Professional now comes with an array of standard tools that should not be dismissed, starting with Unit Testing. SP1 adds better JavaScript debugging and integration as well as a UI for many of the new tools but more importantly a faster HTML designer. And then there are the add-ons I could not live without:
  • SQL Server 2005 or 2008 Express, though technically not an add-on I feel that VS2008 is not useful without it, it allows me to forget about the database issues I have when moving the project to another machine or making backups.
  • Axialis IconWorkshop Lite  just help to make icons fast and as a WEB developer it’s something that I do once per project.
  • Clarius T4 Editor Community Edition, T4 (Text Templating Transformation Toolkit)  is a powerful Visual Studio code generation engine and the editor adds Previews and IntelliSence to T4 development.
  • Clone Detective, I hate code smell this tool just help to find it and deal with it.
  • CodeRush Express, though not without it’s issues, once I started using it I could not do without it. It includes features from Coderush and Refactor! Pro, 2 product I wish I had the money to buy.
    • Code Style Enforcer is a DXCore add-on that allows me to ensure naming conventions in my code.
  • Guidance Automation Extension and Toolkit is essential to run guidance packages here bellow:
    • Enterprise Library, though I use it less the Caching, Cryptography, Exception Handling, Logging, Policy Injection and Validation Application blocks are invaluable.
    • Web Client Software Library
    • Web Service Security Guidance Package
    • Web Service Software Factory: Modeling Edition
  • GhostDoc makes it easy to document my code and create XML documentation.
  • Microsoft Chart Controls finally the ASP.NET missing controls are available!
  • Microsoft Silverlight 2 though I have yet to find a good reason to use it I am sure I will sooner or later.
  • MSBuild Shell Extension for when I want to rebuild my project without opening VS or a command line.
  • Power Toys for Visual Studio 2008
    • Resource Refactoring moving to a resource based application is but a click away.
    • Source Code Outliner seeing the project from a code perspective
    • VS.NET 2008 Command Prompt Here loads the VS environment variable command prompt from the Windows Explorer
    • ASP.NET 2.0 Web Server Here allows me to select a folder and load it into Cassini in 1 click.
  • RockScroll is a Visual Studio scrollbar extension that allow me to see the location of my changes quickly.
  • Snipper a VS snippet file editor.
  • Subversion version control system is the best I found in the open source community for Visual Studio, you will also need  TortoiseSVN or AnkhSVN to integrate into VS. WinMerge will also be integrated for Diffs, I recommend it with or without TortoiseSVN, it made my life easier more than once.
  • Spell Checker well we all know I can’t spell, can you?
  • Visual Linq Builder teaches me Linq
  • Visual Local History allows me to go back to older code without having to use a Version Control Server
    
• The browsers:
  • Microsoft Internet Explorer, being one of the 2 “exceptions” when it comes to browsers is essential to have the big 5 to test but more importantly to have the 2 exceptions Internet Explorer and the dreaded Safari. With Internet Explorer comes a few useful tools:
    • IE Developer Toolbar, the array of html related tools it has makes a difference in my life.
    • Fiddler 2 will tells me what is happening over http.
    • Web Development Helper tells me about the ASP.NET Viewstate and Tracing as well JavaScript issues.
  • Mozilla Firefox, during development I exclusively use Firefox (and IE to check if something is broken), Firefox also has a few really good add-ons:
    • FireBug, my life would end without it! From JavaScript debugging to Network monitor and so much more!
      • YSlow will tell me why the site is slow, the reports are great.
      • FireUnit a new kid on the block Unit Testing for JavaScript.
    • ColorZilla click, point and voila the RGB colour of the HTML element.
    • Dummy Lipsum creates dummy text using Lorem Ipsum
    • FireShot allows me to capture entire web pages as graphic files (PNG, GIF, JPEG, BMP) for future reference.
    • Html Validator to check how badly I break the HTML rules
    • IE Tab allows me to open an Internet Explorer tab in Firefox
    • JSView opens external files (JS, CSS, …) in a code view window.
    • MesureIt a pixel ruler.
    • Quick Locale Switcher for when I work on localizable web applications.
    • Web developer is a set of tools for developers, too many to mention.
      
  • Google Chrome, the general rule is: “If it works in Firefox it will be fine in Chrome and Opera”, however it does not hurt to check, the same applies to Opera.
  • Apple Safari, need I add more, I hate this browser but it exists and I can not ignore it.
    
• Paint.NET, I do not have the need CorelDraw Graphic Suite or Adobe Creative Suite so Paint.NET does the trick just fine.
  
• Internet Information Services 7 is an essential tool for .NET development.
  • Microsoft URL Rewrite Module, URL rewriting made easy.
  • Bit Rate Throttling for when simulations are part of the deal, I also use Charles for this type of situation.
  • FTP Publishing Service 7, the update to FTP Publishing Service 6.
    
• Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 SP1 for when I want to try something fancy without the risks.
  

This list is not exhaustive but it’s a good beginning. Next in this series “The database dilemma”