Debugging mobile web apps can be tricky and somewhat frustrating, especially if you need to scrounge around for different devices to test on, or install SDKs for a (typically imperfect) emulation of the targeted client platforms.
In this context, one clear advantage of mobile web app development (as compared with native app development) is that you can utilize standard browser-based developer tools to debug your application. Based on my personal preference for remote debugging, the one I recommend in this app development tutorial is Chrome with its DevTools. Other standard options include Firefox with Firebug or Opera’s Dragonfly tools.
Some of the reasons I prefer Chrome with its DevTools include:
- Mobile emulator in Chrome’s DevTools. This is perhaps alone sufficient reason to select Chrome for debugging of mobile web apps. Key features include emulation of touch events, user agent spoofing, network bandwidth throttling, geolocation overrides, device orientation overrides, and CSS Media Type Emulation.
- Interactive editor. Ability to edit JavaScript or CSS on-the-fly.
- Superior JavaScript debugger. Allows for DOM breakpoints and provides the ability to profile your JavaScript code execution time.
- Built-in JSON and XML viewers. Avoids the need for any plugins to inspect server responses.
- Support for the Android Debug Bridge (ADB) protocol directly over USB. Facilitates easy instantiation of a remote debugging session. (Here is a good tutorial by Google on how to start remotely debugging in Chrome.)
- Dynamic inspection of resources. Allows you to inspect your app’s local data sources, including IndexedDB or Web SQL databases, local and session storage, cookies, and Application Cache resources. You can also quickly inspect your application’s visual resources, including images, fonts, and style sheets.
- To test the layout and cross browsing compatibility of your web app, you can also use some helpful online tools, such as BrowserStack. Just enter the URL for your application, select the browser, version, and operating system, and you’ll get the emulated view (and load speed) of your site in that environment. Another useful tool for the this purposes is CrossBrowserTesting.
Wrap up — With the continued rapid expansion of the number, variety and sophistication of mobile devices on the market and in use today, the need for effective, user-friendly, high performance mobile applications is likely to increase substantially. Being able to develop these applications intelligently and efficiently will therefore continue to be of paramount importance.
Many factors must be considered when choosing between the web, native, and hybrid options for mobile applications. Each has its own advantages, but mobile web apps will often represent your most efficient development (and therefore time-to-market) option. Should you choose to go down that path, I hope this web app development tutorial helps get you more directly and successfully to your destination.
This article has originally appeared in the Toptal Blog, and has since been edited and updated by the author.
