The Webmasters Must Have Software Toolkit
The focus on this list is for the beginning webmaster starting out with all 100% free software and using a windows based PC.
FTP Client: The best choice here is Filezilla. Filezilla has now been around for many years and has the benefit of being free, and is continually being updated. I have used Filezilla personally for around 6 years and it has performed flawlessly for me. This is one great piece of software that happens to not only be free, but also open source.
Graphics Software: For graphics I would recommend Paint.net. Another really nice free program that is always being updated and refined. Paint.net has grown from a quite simple “paint” replacement into a powerful graphics tool. It is a light and fast program for simple image creation or editing photos. Paint.net also supports plugins that can enhance the functionality even more.
Text and HTML editor: A really nice simple text and HTML editor I would use Notepad2. For a simple no-nonsense editor that is miles ahead of the standard notepad.exe, notepad2 is a great choice for starting out with simple HTML and web-editing. It is one of those pieces of software that is installed right away on any new computer I use. Once installed, just be sure to active the line numbers feature.
Web Browser: Add a few great extensions to the Firefox browser, and you have an awesome browser and webmaster assistant all in one. So along with the basic Firefox install, this short list of extensions are ones that I use daily to assist in web design development and programming. (Just to note I use quite a few more, but those are great for getting started)
- The Web Developer Toolbar
- Search Status
- Live HTTP headers
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i also use filezilla i liked cuteftp for quite some time but the nonfree part of it was pretty annoying. paint.net i have never used i always use photoshop. i use this program ninite whenever i reinstall windows it is awesome and a program called notepad++ was listed on there. i installed it and forgot about it until now i will use it for a project this weekend or possibly the notepad2 you suggest. i have always used firefox but i just started using chrome and the inspect element right click feature is really awesome and so is its source viewing for web pages i am going to stick with it for a while.