So here’s a list of some essential web development resources.

ThemeForest – Part of the Envato Suite

A store of literally thousands of premium WordPress & eCommerce themes, html builds and PSD templates, all at very low prices making it the perfect place to start if you’ve got a small budget or limited resources. Starting with a premium theme can often get rid of the headaches caused by the menial jobs (hover states, contact forms, cross-browser compatibility)

Github – Code Repository Browser

Looking through open-source work is a brilliant way to learn a new language or way of working. Github is a hosted GIT repository site that houses millions of lines of code for you to look through. Viewing code is free, as is hosting publicly visible repositories but there is also a paid-version to keep your code hidden.

Litmus – Email Test Suite

Although the price is pretty high, starting at $50 per month, the service is invaluable if you’re considering an email campaign which needs to support a wide array of email clients (and all of their quirks!). Litmus allows you to test out your build, rendering it in all clients you could want – from Lotus Notes and Outlook to iPad & BlackBerry.

Smashing Magazine – Resource Blog

Wonderful articles ranging from theory to practical implementations of code. The site is aimed more towards HTML5/CSS3 than heavyweight back-end languages like C# or PHP, although there are a few.

StackOverflow – Q&A

If you’ve been banging your head against the desk for a few hours on a small issue that you swear should work, then I highly recommend StackOverflow. There are thousands of intelligent and helpful developers out there who will be able to help you with your issue, or at least point you in the correct direction. It is a question & answer platform, however, so don’t forget to contritube both ways.

This gave me the good fortune to see how 30 or so websites handle opting out of their newsletter.

The best that I came across were when there was a clearly defined opt-out button in the footer of the email which, on clicking, opened a new window with a “confirm your choice to unsubscribe” to push. On clicking, the page was automatically closed. Wham-bam thank you mam.

The bad types were the systems which required me to enter in my email address that I wished to unsubscribe from. Seriously, I just came from my email window, surely you could have sent that information over as a parameter. This system, however, is dreamy when compared with several or so websites which required me to login to their site, using a long since forgotten username and password system, then eventually navigating to the correct “my profile” settings. Pretty shoddy. At least it wasn’t as bad as the newsletters which require you email the newsletter with only “unsubscribe” in the subject line.

The worst offender however was a certain train booking service which required me to login with a username (not an email address), navigate 3 menus deep, un-tick 3 individual boxes (don’t sign me up to: 3rd party, offers…etc…) and then click submit. After clicking submit, excited in the knowledge that I no longer would receive timely rail maintainence updates, I was surprised when I recieved yet another email from said website telling me that I had unsubscribed and no longer would receive any emails. Gah.

I have a feeling that in a few days I may recieve another email from them reminding me that I’m continually unsubscribed, oh and btw check out these new offers!

So please, I know newsletter creation is a ball-ache but please, just one “confirm” button to save sanity and inbox capacity for all.