Top 5 Chrome Extensions for Developers

Nowadays, there is a heavy competition among browsers to attract users. Most modern browsers have the capability to do much more than just browsing. They provide an array of features through add-ons and extensions for people belonging to different categories, especially for programmers and developers.

Google Chrome is the most mainstream browser and has a large community for developing versatile and efficient extensions. Programmers can use these unmatched amounts of extensions to make programming less frustrating and time-efficient.

Top 5 Chrome Extensions for Developers

Here are the 5 best extensions you should be using if you are a developer.

• Web developer
• Wappalyzer
• Codota – Java Code Viewer Developer Tool
• Redux DevTools
• User-Agent Switcher

1. Web Developer

Chrome offers built-in developer tools for website developers to do various types of experiments. In addition, website developers have the widest range of extensions to choose from the Chrome Web Store. One of the multipurpose extensions for developers is ‘Web Developer’. As the name suggests, this extension offers aid to web developers in variety of ways. It provides you with a toolbar that offers multiple features to help you in developing and analyzing a website.

Go to Chrome Web Store and search for ‘Web Developer’ extension. Install it on your browser by clicking on “Add to Chrome” button.

The extension will add a gear shaped icon next to Chrome’s address bar. Click on it to view a toolbar offering wide range of options.

Following are some of the features the extension offers:

• Disabling JavaScript, notifications, pop-up and plugins.
• Prevent all types of cookies like domain cookies and session’s cookies.
• Disable stylesheets, images and various form options.
• Resizing browser to check responsive layouts.
• Click on the “Options” tab and go to “Colors” section in the pop-up. Here you can turn on syntax highlighting theme to light or dark to view the codes in different colors with proper syntax.
• You can also setup responsive layout sizes for testing your webpages on different dimensions.

2. Wappalyzer

As a programmer you may need to analyze certain websites or have to develop a similar one. In all such case, what you need is a Wappalyzer extension on Chrome browser. It is a simple extension with a very powerful feature to detect the web technology that a website is using.

Open any website and click on the Wappalyzer extension icon. The icon will show the framework used by the website like PHP or WordPress. It will provide you with a list of details to find the followings.

• CMS used on the website like WordPress.
• Web server and framework.
• Analytics, ad network, CDN and caching system.
• JavaScript libraries and payment processor

You can on each link to get more details of the technology in a new tab page.

3. Codota – Java Code Viewer Developer Tool

If you are a Java programmer then Codota Chrome extension can help to analyze the code. It is a useful extension that provides details of a code snippet which can also be saved for future use. This extension only supports a few sites like GitHub and StackOverflow.

After installing the extension, it can automatically detect if ay JavaScript codes are available on the allowed websites. You can hover the mouse over the script code to see the extension icon. It will allow you to copy or save the code for future use.

You can scan the website for any Java class or method and get the relevant code. The detail is quite extensive and can be a time effective approach for the programmer. Unfortunately, the extension is available to use on just six websites at the moment. The good news is that the developers of the extension claim that the extension will be compatible with more websites in the future.

4. Redux DevTools

Redux DevTools is another extension that helps in testing and debugging of your application. It can help a programmer to fix different errors and bugs during the stage of developing an application.

You can use this extension to open a panel where the code of your application will be inspected at different states. Details regarding the extension are also provided if you are a beginner. This application is must for the programmers that develop applications using the Redux library.

5. User-Agent Switcher

User-Agent Switcher is an extension through which you can mimic other browsers while using Chrome. Programmers and developers are aware that in order to achieve perfection, their apps should run in every environment. This is a great extension that helps to accomplish that.

After installing, clicking on the extension icon provides array of options to choose from. You not only mimic the desktop browsers but android and iOS browsers are also available.

Wrap Up

Chrome’s default developer tool offers extensive functions for developers. However, you may feel it is cluttered, especially when you are using at bottom of the browser. Try one of the above explained Chrome extensions for developers and improve your daily work.