Guide to 60+ Free Web Development Tools & Resources for Entrepreneurs

Save big bucks on your startup or ecommerce web site by DIY with free tools

By Shara Karasic, Work.com Community Manager

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From ecommerce to social networking, there are many cool new tools that allow you to get your web presence jumpstarted for cheap. Here is a list of the best free resources for web 2.0 design, development, and ecommerce:

Free Web Design Tools (22):
Background Image Maker
Cornershop – rounded corner graphics
CSS Button Generator
CSS Rollover Generator
CSS Tab Designer
curvyCorners – free JavaScript program that will create on-the-fly rounded corners
Design Patterns – flickr collection which captures consistent, unique, or interesting interfaces and design flows from across the web
Favicon Generator – create that tiny graphic that shows up in the browser tab
Gradient Maker
Grid Layouts – Javascript for grid layouts
Layout-o-matic
Listamatic – create lists with different bullets
More than 100 Web 2.0 Online Generators - grid layouts
My cool button – make cool web 2.0 buttons
Open Source Web Design – free web design templates
Resizr – resize images
RoundedCornr
Stripe Generator 2.0
Tabs Generator – tweak size, corners, colors
Web 2.0 Badges
Web 2.0 Colour Palette
Welie.com – patterns in interaction design

Free Web Development Tools (11):
Ajax Rain – Ajax/Javascript/DHTML examples and demos
Contact Form Generator – create a form-to-email with no programming skills
Create RSS Feed – automatically create RSS feed in XML
Drupal – open source content management system
GroundWork – open source IT monitoring
Help Desk – list of help desk and issue tracker software
Joomla – open source content management system
Mashable's 250+ Tools and Resources for Coding the Web
Nagios – open source host, service and network monitoring program
script.aculo.us – user interfaces & animations
Wufoo – build a form easily

Free Ecommerce Tools (7):
107 Add to Cart Buttons of the Top Online Retailers
Bigcartel – free online store
cubecart – PHP & MySQL shopping cart
Fat.Free.Cart – works with PayPal and Google Checkout
Magento – open source ecommerce platform
Opencart – PHP-based online shopping cart
Zen Cart – free open source shopping cart system

Free Feed/Widgets Tools (2):
Feedburner – create an RSS feed, allow subscriptions, and track feed stats
Widgetbox – create a “portable chunk of the web”

Free Community Tools (5):
Google Groups – create your own free email group
me.com
Ning – create your own community
phpbb – open source message board software
Yahoo Groups – create your own free email group

Free SEO/Advertising Tools (4):
Google Keyword Tool
Keyword Rank Checker
SEO Book Keyword Research Tool
Yahoo Site Explorer – analyze backlinks

Free Web Promotion Tools (5):
del.icio.us – make it easy for your users to bookmark your site on del.icio.us
digg
Pingomatic – after updating your site/blog, ping a lot of directories
HTML2PDF - create a PDF of your site for marketing purposes
Technorati – make sure you tag your blog posts to show up

Free Web Analytics/Tracking (5):
Alexa – compare web traffic
Google Analytics
sitemeter
StatCounter
Google Alerts

There are many more great free resources – if you have one please add it as a comment to this guide!

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The official source of 60+ Free Web Development Tools & Resources for Entrepreneurs is
the Web Development Software page at Business.com

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Guide to 60+ Free Web Development Tools & Resources for Entrepreneurs

Save big bucks on your startup or ecommerce web site by DIY with free tools