Console

Interesting tools

Each week we feature and review 2-3 interesting developer tools in the Console newsletter and on our website.

Our selection criteria are explained below. The more of these questions we can answer positively, the more likely a tool is to be featured. We try to be objective but there is always a subjective element to deciding what we think is the best, most interesting set of tools each week:

• Is this interesting and useful to developers?
• Is the primary user a developer? A developer might use it, but is it built specifically with developers in mind?
• Is there a self-service signup? A demo or speaking to sales may be an option, but an individual developer should be able to try it themselves without speaking to anyone.
• Would this form part of a regular-use set of developer tools? Does it fit into the development cycle? Is it a part of the development flow?
• Does it make me a better developer? Does it help me reduce/manage bugs, improve build times, get code to production faster, reduce/manage errors, etc?
• Would this be used by advanced power-users? Does it support dark mode, is there an API and/or CLI, are there keyboard shortcuts, what about accessibility?
• Is the tool high quality? Does it work on multiple platforms and/or browsers? Is it easy to install/deploy? Does it do the job it claims?
• Is it being actively maintained with regular bug fixes and updates?
• Does it have good documentation? Is it fast?
• Does it have any negative impact on security or privacy?
• How would I feel recommending this to my friends? Would I tweet a link to it?

Betas

We only list early access, alpha, or beta releases of tools where developers are the primary user.

To determine whether something falls under this definition, we use Semver version numbers i.e. the release must be pre 1.0 and/or have an appropriate label in the version number e.g. 1.0.0-beta. Alternatively, the word "beta", "preview" or similar should appear somewhere easily discoverable on the website, release notes, and/or documentation. Any GA or stable releases are not eligible.

Sponsors

Console works with vendors who want to reach our audience of experienced developers. We pride ourselves on being transparent in our editorial approach and all potential partners must meet the above selection criteria before we will work with them. Partners are able to choose the date of their review, which will appear first in the newsletter, but they do not get to influence or even read the review before it is published.