Right after Apple's event ended, our frontend group was originally still chatting about the iPhone 17's colors and camera, but then someone unexpectedly dropped a screenshot showing a neatly formatted block of HTML code, and the whole group went off-topic and started talking about this HTML formatter. To be honest, everyone usually uses this kind of thing too, but that day the discussion was especially lively, maybe because everyone was tired from watching the event and just wanted an excuse to slack off.
The story goes like this: a guy in the group had taken on a freelance gig, and the client gave him a bunch of HTML files exported from an old system. The code was a mess. Tags were nested chaotically, attribute quotes were sometimes there and sometimes not, and indentation was completely random. In some places there were seven or eight spaces, while in others everything was crammed together. He said the moment he opened the file, it felt like looking at a ball of yarn played with by a cat. He originally wanted to clean it up manually, but after half an hour he had only finished one page, and his eyes were about to go blind. Later, someone sent him an HTML formatter. He pasted the code in, clicked once, and the whole block immediately became clean and refreshing. Line breaks appeared where they should, indentation appeared where it should, and the tag hierarchy was clear at a glance. He said that moment felt even better than finishing the Apple event.
Actually, HTML formatting is neither a big deal nor a small one. When writing code normally, editors usually have built-in formatting, so people may not pay much attention. But when you really need to modify someone else's code, or copy a minified piece of HTML from somewhere, it can be maddening without a formatting tool. Especially that kind of HTML compressed into one line, with thousands of characters crammed together. You cannot even find the closing tag of a div, and can only scan line by line with your eyes, which is terrifyingly inefficient.
Someone in the group also mentioned that some formatting tools are quite detailed. For example, you can choose whether indentation uses spaces or tabs, whether spaces are 2 or 4, whether attributes should wrap, whether empty tags should self-close, and even unify uppercase and lowercase. These options may look inconspicuous, but when actually used, they can save a lot of trouble. For example, if some people on your team are used to tabs and others to spaces, the formatting clashes after the code is submitted. At that point, running the formatter uniformly makes everyone comfortable.
Another point that came up more often is that some online HTML formatting tools also support pasting a URL directly, or uploading files, and can even handle multiple files in an entire project. For situations where old code needs to be organized in batches, this feature is very practical. No need to manually copy and paste files one by one, and the time saved is enough to scroll through several Apple event news items.
However, some group members also reminded everyone that when using online tools, you need to be careful. Some tools upload your code to a server. If it is an internal company project or code involving sensitive information, it is best to use a local formatting tool or an editor's built-in plugin. After all, when it comes to code security, it never hurts to be more careful.
By the end of the chat, everyone basically reached a consensus: HTML formatting tools are something you may not remember to use normally, but at critical moments they can really save you. Especially right after an Apple event, when everyone wants to get off work early, never manually struggle with something that can be done in one click. The guy in the group who took the freelance gig later said he had bookmarked that tool, and from then on he would format first before modifying anything when taking on work, which saved him a lot of worry.
So you see, what started as chatting about Apple's event turned into a frontend tool recommendation session. But that is also fine, at least it was more interesting than just talking about phone specs.