I'm a novice web developer, and I've had Firebug recommended for debugging several times. So far, however, I've just been using Chrome's built-in "Developer Tools". It seems to do everything that Firebug does, and is cleaner and more organized as a bonus.
As I get more advanced in my debugging, are there features that Firebug has that I'll miss out on with Chrome Developer Tools? If so, what are they?
Related: Firebug-like debugger for Google Chrome (kind of out-of-date)
I haven't run into a Firebug feature I've missed yet after switching to Chrome.
The Webkit Developer Tools is based on Firebug, so all the main features and familiarity are there (such as the $0, and console object).
There are some small differences, such as DevTools does not have a CSS tab(although CSS stylesheets can be manipulates in the Elements tab).
The Webkit Tools also have the Timeline, Profiles, and Storage tabs. The timeline tab logs loading, CSS rendering, and js scripting. The Profile tab profiles resource usage, and the Storage tab shows and allows changes in the site's database, localStorage, sessionStorage, and cookies.
Finally, both tools have their own minor variances, which make various actions a tiny bit easier or harder. My advice is to use Firebug for Firefox, and DevTools for Webkit browsers, since only Firebug Lite works on Chrome, and it lacks many features the normal firebug has (and its build-in for Chrome aka included w/browser).
I feel a lot more comfortable using Firebug. I can't think of specifics at the moment, but sometimes I'll try debugging something in Safari or Chrome and it seems like such a PITA that I launch Firefox and get whatever done quickly.
The DOM tab is a plus, for one. It's more accessible and well laid out than Chrome's equivalent. I prefer the way DOM and other JS objects are logged to the console in Firebug, too.
Firebug plug-ins like Pixel Perfect are very useful as well. I don't know whether any such tool exists for Chrome.
Overall, it doesn't matter because you have to test in both browsers, anyway. And IE, so might as well compare it to IE's Dev tools (which have improved, but still are not good compared to FF or Webkit's).
I don't think there's anything advanced in particular present in Firebug but not in Chrome that you'll be missing.
Can you do live-code editing (CSS, JavaScript, DOM, ...) with Chromium Dev Tools (btw, i'm using chromium, and not chrome)? I like the audit tools in Chromium though :) Also, does Web Dev shows AJAX calls? Frankly, I like both Chromium and Firefox. +1 to the red fox because we've been riding together for so long and +1 to chromium for being more HTML5-compatible than Firefox (whatsup with that, FF dev guys?)
Firebug has the possibility to have other plugin attach to it such as Firecookie. For the rest they are pretty similar, it's all about taste in my opinion.