Opera Software releases alpha of new web developer tools
Ever since firebug was released as a developer tool for firefox, developers have asked themselves how they ever managed to live without it. In particular the powerful javascript debugger and the ability to manipulate html and css directly for testing has made it the most indispensable for web developers today.
The WebKit team behind Safari have earlier released what I would classify as firebug lite with a beautiful user interface.
This made Opera fall behind amongst the browsers promoting standards, and they in particular lost many developers to other browsers. Opera have previously released some developer tools, but they’ve been too simple and too unstable to be used as an everyday tool.
After two years in development a new era is on the steps. Opera Software have announced Opera Dragonfly alpha, a tool that aim to take a neck shot on firebug.
As previously mentioned this is an alpha, and thus lacks features but not bugs, however, this is a great step ahead and I may move back to my favourite browser once again. The current featureset is also pretty scarse:
- JavaScript debugger
- DOM inspector
- CSS inspector
- Command Line to allow commands to be inputed
- Error Console that outputs validation errors and warnings exhibited by the CSS and JavaScript connected with the page
- Proxy to allow debugging directly on mobile devices
Features planned for next alpha:
- Improved handling of threads in javascript
- Inline CSS editing
- Infrastructure for localization.
- Improved remote debugging
It should also be mentioned that Opera Dragonfly will be open source and any software implementing “the Scope module” (spec soon to be published) will be able to use it. I think this is great, because that means that other software also can use Opera Dragonfly and that other developer may push patches too.
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