Finding good software poses a challenge. Here are some that I use in the course of developing and maintaining mobile apps. I can generally recommend these…
Shopping
Mobile Amazon.com Ok – I know that this is a silly link. I mainly have it here to test my affiliate link that I use in Cash or Click. If you are browsing from your desktop, instead of smartphone, then you’ll want to click the “Full Site” button at the bottom.
Logo Design & Backgrounds
I used these guys to crowd-source the sheep-background for Powernap and the logo for Ascendly.com. Actually pretty happy with the process.
Hosting
Webfaction This company has served me well for several years. I know that there are other firms out there that are quite good.
Nearly Free SpeechProbably the cheapest way to host a simply php site. I used them at my last company. There are limitation, such as no SSL, but there are quite good.
Server Maintence
Fugu – I use this for getting my files onto the server. It is one of the few secure file transfer programs available for the Mac.
Server & Site Monitoring
Dot-Com Monitor – I used this at my old job to monitor how our sites were doing. It has a nice up/down dashboard and will actually call your phone or send a text message, in addition to normal e-mail alerts. There are other services like this out there, but when I last evaluated them, these guys were roughly an order of magnitude less expensive.
Pliner.net – I’ve used this free monitoring service for years. They don’t seem to spam me, they just politely monitor my site. They only provide (the last time I checked) e-mail based notification, but that is perfect for your less-critical sites.
Network Testing
SpeedLimit I use this to test my apps as if they were on a slow cell phone network. My network in the house is quite fast, so have a way to slow things down is nicer than driving out to the Edge part of town
SpeedTest.net This is just one of the many free bandwidth testers available for your iPhone. The screenshot here shows what type of speeds to expect for a slow Edge connection. I like to test my apps using SpeedLimit with the Speed set to 384K (3G) and Delay set to 250, for normal usage, and 48k(Dialup) and 1500ms for extreme cases. Anything worse than the latter means the user is fading in and out of network coverage.
Here is a screenshot I took after running the test from my living room…, upstairs…, next to the window. Hmm, why can’t we have real cell phone reception in our neighborhood?
JSON File Validation
JSONLint lets you past in your .json file and gives nice hints as to any problems. There are others out there, too.