Firefox offers some excellent developer extensions. You can easily download
them by selecting Tools➪Extensions, and then clicking the Get More
Extensionslink. You’re taken to this page:
https://addons.update.mozilla.org/extensions/?application={ec
8030f7-c20a-464f-9b0e-13a3a9e97384}
One very popular extension is Web Developer, which adds a menu and a tool-
bar that offer the Web designer and programmer lots of useful extra features
for both designing and debugging. One word of caution though about down-
loading extensions: These are executables, so they can easily contain viruses
or other damaging code. To me, the safe approach is to avoid downloading
the latest, newest extensions (which by definition haven’t yet been proven
safe because few people have tried them out). On the other hand, popular,
classic extensions like Web Developer are pretty much guaranteed safe. If an
extension such as Web Developer posed a problem, you would hear about it
pretty quickly in the computer press.
Finding a better bug trap ..................................................................
Some people like the strictness of the “official” validator, with its stern insis-
tence on the most meticulous code. It’s just not me (nor is it Microsoft, thank
goodness). I got tired of that kind of infinite attention to inconsequential
detail in graduate school. The further I went up the academic ladder, the nar-
rower the focus. Some people thrive in this environment (take a look at any
academic journal to see the kind of writing it produces — sometimes there
are more footnotes than article text).
If you’re like me, you may find this validator more trouble than it’s worth.
Happily, others are available. You can use the facilities built into Microsoft’s
Visual Studio, or try the Web Design Group’s (WDG) CSS and HTML valida-
tors. I’ve found them to be more flexible and friendly that the W3C utilities.
Go here for the WDG HTML validation:
http://www.htmlhelp.com/tools/validator/upload.html
Or simply Google for CSS validatoror HTML validatorto find other good
debugging utilities.
314 Part IV: Advanced CSS Techniques
