Apps To Fusion

 

Firebug is Firefox browser add-on, which is a must have APEX or web developers. It can be downloaded from http://getfirebug.com/.

Some of firebug features at a glance.

• View and edit HTML Source and CSS (Cascading Style Sheet).
• Javascript debugging
• Explore DOM (Document Object Model)
• Execute JavaScript in command line
• JavaScript logging using console command
• Monitor network activity

Video on features on firebug (6:18 min).

Enough said ... why do APEX developers care about?
At the end of the day Oracle Application Express Engine has to produce HTML output to the browsers to present it to the users. APEX engine uses PL/SQL code and HTML in templates to generate HTML output with data. Viewing HTML source in a readable format will help when you customize templates and themes to change look and feel of application. As you see changes on the fly, before modifying templates you can choose the best look for your application. These changes does not effect application used by other users.

Firebug also provides the most effective debugging for JavaScripts. If you ask me to close my eyes and pick one firebug feature that saved my day that would definitely be ... seeing the version of CSS and JavaScripts currently loaded or used by my application. There were few scenarios where my changes to CSS/JavaScripts are not seen in the versions used by browser. It was due to browser cache or unknown issue that caused duplicate records in APEX_WORSPACE_FILES table.