Technical stuff Requirements are like water. They're easier to build on when they're frozen.

So, you want to use that Apple machine for developing websites. That’s pretty easy to setup, here are some guidelines you can use in order to create the basic environment for creating great web applications.

1. MAMP
   • even though you already have Apache and PHP installed (oh, and Ruby as well), you also need the mySQL; basically it’s not that trivial to add the popular DB to the mix, and this is where MAMP comes into play: it provides the sqlite for quick and easy part, and also mySQL for the more complicated items
   • it also includes the phpMyAdmin in case you don’t want to use  more powerful tool
   • download it from the official page or from sourceforge
   • installation is pretty straightforward, but do take a look at the last section here
   • start the MAMP application
   • the path to your webroot is /Applications/MAMP/htdocs
2. Editor
   1. Aptana is for heavy users
      • since it’s based on Eclipse, you’ll quickly find your way around
      • download it from here and use the online documentation in case you run into trouble
   2. Smultron is a light-weight, extremely capable and configurable editor
      • please don’t get fooled by the looks of it, take your time and explore it; it’s a valuable companion
      • the SourceForge page of the Smultron project
      • get directly the improved interface, a patch which appeared on the internet because many users complained about the icons
3. a developer’s file manager: muCommander
   • usually you’ll find yourself limited by the multitude of Finder windows, so you’ll miss the MidnightCommander / TotalCommander / etc. software; meet muCommander; since it runs on amy platform, you might just take it with you on your other environments and modernize the old mc
   • here’s an alternative download source

That should be it. Congratulations!

Are you using something else to this mix? Tell us all about it.