How to reload/refresh a web page without leaving my web development IDE?

In Windows XP, this should work:

• Create a VBS file called refresh.vbs:

  Set WshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell") WshShell.AppActivate("Firefox")WshShell.SendKeys "{F5}"WshShell.AppActivate("TextPad")

• Create a shortcut to this file on your desktop.

• Right-click the shortcut icon and go to Properties.

  • In the General tab, click on the Change button next to "Opens with".Browse to C:\WINDOWS\system32\cscript.exeSelect Microsoft Console Based Script Host.

  • In the Shortcut tab, enter a Shortcut key e.g CTRL + ALT + R. In the Run dropdown, select Minimised.

Now, when you hit CTRL + ALT + R, it will refresh the current tab in Firefox.

I created a simple applescript that I set up as a global hotkey using Alfred.

Here's the applescript

tell application "Firefox"    activate    tell application "System Events"        tell process "Firefox"            keystroke "r" using {command down, shift down}        end tell    end tellend tell

If you want to make sure the focus stays in your editor, you could add these lines. Remember to replace Coda (my editor of choice) to whatever it is you are using

tell application "Coda"    activateend tell

This is my favourite bash one-liner:

while /bin/true ; do inotifywait --recursive --event modify ./ ; echo "reload" | nc -c localhost 32000 ; done

It uses Firefox Remote Control AddOn, which it notifys about changes in and below the current directories files. So all you need is to save any file in the project and the same moment the current Firefox tab gets reloaded.This one is unix-ish, should work on Linux+Mac if you have inotify, won't work on Windows without adaptions.