---
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title: Setting Up Your Development System
collection: developer
version: current
locale: en-us
portal_url: https://docs.salesforce.com/developer/current/en-us/platform/salesforce-pages-developers-guide/guides/pages/mobile/pages-mobile-platform-dev-process-system.md
canonical_url: https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/platform/salesforce-pages-developers-guide/guide/pages-mobile-platform-dev-process-system.html
source_site: developer.salesforce.com
content_type: documentation
content_hash: 2adaa2f2449937c799800a72036210605c436762020c6845dd1f584431076bb3
products:
  - Visualforce Developer Guide
  - Platform Developer Content
---

# Setting Up Your Development System

Salesforce provides several different tools and ways to write, edit, and view your code.

## Choosing Your Editor

First set up the tool you’ll use to write code. The Developer Console, the Salesforce Extensions for Visual Studio Code, and the Setup editor all work when developing for the Salesforce app, Lightning Experience, and Salesforce Classic. The only exception is the Visualforce Development Mode footer, which is available in Salesforce Classic only.

## Viewing Your Visualforce Page

In Salesforce Classic, you can view your page using the https://_yourInstance_.salesforce.com/apex/PageName URL pattern. This method doesn’t work for viewing Salesforce app pages in Lightning Experience, because pages you view using direct URL access always display in Salesforce Classic.

To view your page in Lightning Experience, go to https://_yourInstance_.salesforce.com/lightning. The simplest way to get to a specific Visualforce page is to create a tab for it, and then navigate to that tab via the All Items section in the App Launcher.

For a more long-term approach, create an “In Development” app, and add and remove your Visualforce tabs to it as you work.

1.  From Setup, enter `Apps` in the **Quick Find** box, then select **App Manager**.
2.  Click **New Lightning App**, and then create a custom app for your pages in development.

    **note:** Consider restricting your app to only System Administrators, or a profile you’ve created for developers in your organization.

3.  From Setup, enter `App Menu` in the **Quick Find** box, then select **App Menu**.
4.  Make sure your In Development app is set to **Visible** in App Launcher.
5.  From Setup, enter `Tabs` in the **Quick Find** box, then select **Tabs**.
6.  Click **New** in the Visualforce Tabs section, and then create a custom tab for the page currently in development. Make the tab visible only to your development user profile, and add the tab only to your In Development app.
7.  Repeat the previous step for each page you want to add to your In Development app.

You can also add the following bookmarklet to your browser’s menu or toolbar to navigate directly to your page. This JavaScript fires the Lightning Experience `navigateToURL` event, and is the equivalent of entering in the classic /apex/PageName URL.

```visualforce
javascript:(function(){ 
  var pageName = prompt('Visualforce page name:'); 
  $A.get("e.force:navigateToURL").setParams(
    {"url": "/apex/" + pageName}).fire();})();

```