---
title: "ComputerZen: Top 120 cool tools every developer must have"
url: "https://osherove.com/blog/2005/6/20/computerzen-top-120-cool-tools-every-developer-must-have.md"
canonical: "https://osherove.com/blog/2005/6/20/computerzen-top-120-cool-tools-every-developer-must-have.html"
published: "2005-06-20T14:26:00"
updated: "2005-06-20T14:26:00"
tags: ["Cool Tools"]
author: "Roy Osherove"
description: "Scott Hanselman has updated is \" All time amazing super cool tools list \" and its time for all of us to sit back, take a good look and try to lineup what the pros are recommending. You need to be a tool geek to love…"
usage: "Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page)."
license: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
---

# ComputerZen: Top 120 cool tools every developer must have

By Roy Osherove June 20, 2005 In [Cool Tools](https://osherove.com/blog/category/cool-tools)

**Historical article** · Originally published June 20, 2005; technical details may be outdated.

Scott Hanselman has updated is "[All time amazing super cool tools list](http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ScottHanselmans2005UltimateDeveloperAndPowerUsersToolList.aspx)" and its time for all of us to sit back, take a good look and try to lineup what the pros are recommending. You need to be a tool geek to love this, but even if you're not - you should seriously look at these as some of them help make your life as a coder waaay better than they were.

Just look.

Boy am I glad [I asked him](http://www.hanselman.com/blog/content/radiostories/2003/09/09/scottHanselmansUltimateDeveloperAndPowerUsersToolsList.html) to write these things down !

## More in Cool Tools

[All posts in Cool Tools](https://osherove.com/blog/category/cool-tools)

- Jul 19, 2005

    ### [Resharper 2.0 for VS 2005!](https://osherove.com/blog/2005/7/19/resharper-20-for-vs-2005.html)

- Jun 26, 2005

    ### [\[Tool\] Convert NUnit tests to Team System Tests](https://osherove.com/blog/2005/6/26/tool-convert-nunit-tests-to-team-system-tests.html)

- Jun 19, 2005

    ### [LibCheck: List breaking changes between assembly versions](https://osherove.com/blog/2005/6/19/libcheck-list-breaking-changes-between-assembly-versions.html)

- Jun 17, 2005

    ### [Flickr! - get ready for Flippr! (and a new Israeli dev blogger)](https://osherove.com/blog/2005/6/17/flickr-get-ready-for-flippr-and-a-new-israeli-dev-blogger.html)


---

## About the author

**Roy Osherove**: Senior Solutions Architect at AWS working on AI for production and AI-driven development; author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership, with about 20 years of consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery.

### Sites

- [RobotPaper](https://robotpaper.ai/): This blog: AI patterns and anti-patterns, AI and coding agents, and engineering leadership.
- [osherove.com](https://osherove.com): Roy's personal site. Author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership; consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery, plus about 20 years of blog posts.
- [The Art of Unit Testing](https://www.artofunittesting.com): The Art of Unit Testing, 3rd Edition (Manning): readable, maintainable, trustworthy unit tests, plus TDD workshops in C#, JavaScript, Java and Kotlin.
- [5whys.com](https://www.5whys.com): Roy's writing on software team leadership: self-organizing teams, surviving chaos, learning mode and the Elastic Leadership model.
- [Pipeline Driven](https://pipelinedriven.org): Continuous delivery and DevOps practices: build patterns, pipeline-friendly testing, DevOps metrics and enterprise DevOps.
- [Elastic Leadership](https://www.elasticleadership.com): Elastic Leadership, Roy's framework for software team leaders (survival, learning and self-organizing modes).

### Social

- X: https://x.com/royosherove
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/osherove/

### Contact

- Contact form: https://forms.gle/jQSx5KoXvrVA1JCK7

### License

Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page). License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/