I see too many people use alert() when smoke testing a web application when they should be using console.log() instead.

Why should you prefer console.log() over the unmistakably obvious alert() ?

For starters, it doesn’t block the javascript thread, so your page will continue to load normally. It’s common to discover timing bugs when you’ve been relying on alert() in testing, and removing the call later on.

Secondly, console.log() outputs to the consoles of many of the popular browsers, especially Chrome & Firefox. (Tip: press CTRL+SHIFT+J in Chrome or use Firebug’s console in Firefox).

The only gotchya when it comes to console.log if you’re not curently running the console, window has no property console and your script will error out. This is easily remedied by adding this line to the begining of your javascript heavy pages:

1 window . console = window . console || { log : function ( m ) {}, info : function ( m ) {}};

This will use a console if available, if not it will do nothing(more importantly, no errors).