Designer´s Toolbox : 15+ Time Saving Tools- What´s your Secret?

Every Designer has his favorite tools and add-ons that definitely comes in handy when needed. What is more useful than simple, time-saving and handy tools you can use in the development process? Here is a roundup of 15 tools, services and add-ons that is worth your time.

Let us know your experience with the tools listed here or and others that you use to keep you going.

I would like to create a gallery here on Noupe to showcase the best Tools, Services and Add-ons that will definitely save time and effort for designers and developers.

Let us know your favorite tool, just add its link and why do you like it.

You might be interested to check other related posts for more useful tools:

• 13+ Fantastic Tools For Knowing How They’re Doing It
• Handy Designer’s Tools “On The Fly”
• 23+ Impressive Tools for Faster Javascript/Ajax Development

Online Service and Tools

- Postable

We all hate switching all the %u201C< " and ">%u201D signs in our code to %u201C&lt;%u201D and %u201C&gt;%u201D, respectively. This makes including code snippets on any blog very annoying. Postable manages to handle this issue easily, just paste your code in there, hit the button and get your post-friendly code.

- Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3)

Amazon S3 provides a simple web services to store your files, images and database. S3 is fast, super cheap (you only pay for what you use) and reliable.

- Vectormagic

Convert bitmap images to vector images with a few simple clicks

- DNSpinger

Everytime you move to a new host, you will need to change the DNS info to point your domain to the new host, you just don't know when exactly the DNS is propagated. DNSPinger is a web-based tool that pings the website you mentioned every 3 minutes for 24 hours and e-mails you when the Ip is updated (new DNS is activated).

- Typetester

The Typetester is an online application for comparison of the fonts for the screen. Its primary role is to make web designer’s life easier.

- Copyscape

Copyscape service makes it easy to find copies of your content on the Web. Copyscape finds sites that have copied your content without permission, as well as those that have quoted you. Every time i use copyscape, i get disappointed with the number of sites that copy our content without even adding a link to our source article. Defending your content should be the primary object after publishing it, so you should start to use this service soon.

Cross Browser Compatibility

- Browsershots

Browsershots makes screenshots of your web design in various browsers across all different OS platforms. Browsershots is so popular that you will need to wait a few minutes for this service to render screenshots of your website.

- Browsercam

Offer a free trial for 24 hours where you can test your website in all browsers and OS.

15-IETester

A free web browser allowing you to browse websites with the JavaScript & rendering engines of IE8 beta 1, IE7 IE 6 and IE5.5 on Vista and XP

- IE NetRenderer

IE NetRenderer allows you to check how a website is rendered by Internet Explorer 7, 6 or 5.5. Just type in a URL in the field and try it out - it's free!

Website Performance

- Websitegrader

Website Grader is a free seo tool that measures the marketing effectiveness of a website. It provides a score that incorporates things like website traffic, SEO, social popularity and other technical factors.

- Feed Compare

A free web application that you can use for comparing FeedBurner feeds. This tool is great for checking out your competition and noticing trends in growth.

- Web Page Analyzer

Web site speed test to improve website performance. Calculates page size, composition, and download time. The script calculates the size of individual elements and sums up each type of web page component. Based on these page characteristics the script then offers advice on how to improve page load time.

Firefox Add-Ons

- MeasureIt

Draw out a ruler to get the pixel width and height of any elements on a webpage. Makes your life much easier when you're developing and trying to fit pieces together.

- View formatted source

Ever wanted to know the style of every element of the page without having to view the .css file, here is the best add-on to let you view the style on the fly. You can see exactly which CSS rules match for an element. The rules are displayed including file name and line number. The topmost element is that with the highest priority.

- Firebug

One of the best add-ons. I can't recommend this plugin enough! You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page. You will even learn CSS if you use it.