As a marketer, I use a combination of the usual “office” and creative tools. Since I maintain an interest in tech and self-hosting, my list of apps is long.

Hardware

  • Mac Pro (Late 2013) - Running Big Sur, used when I need horsepower.
  • Mac Mini (Late 2014) x2 - Used for self-hosting applications with Docker. Ubuntu 20.04.
  • MacBook Pro (Late 2013) - Main workhorse.
  • iPad Pro 12.9" (Original) - 50% consuming media, 50% writing. Never felt the need to upgrade since I don’t max it out at all.
  • iPhone X - iOS 14.7.1, daily driver, loaded with apps I use everyday only.
  • iPhone 6s Plus - iOS 14.7.1, filled with social and game junk.

Browsers

  • Firefox - Default.
  • Safari - If FF and don’t care about anonymity.
  • Chromium - If FF and Safari don’t work for some reason.

Firefox Plugins

  • uBlock Origin - Replacement for uMatrix.
  • Bitwarden - Uses self-hosted Bitwarden instance.
  • CanvasBlocker - Prevent browser fingerprinting.
  • Chameleon - Changing user-agent.
  • Cookie AutoDelete - Delete cookies every few minutes.
  • Privacy Redirect - Alternative front-ends for Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Reddit and Google.
  • Vimium - Vim-like keyboard navigation.
  • Multi-Account Containers - Separate containers by use.

Safair Plugins

  • 1Blocker - Only decent ad and tracker blocker that works on Mac and iOS.

Command Line

  • iTerm2 - Have tried Hyper, kitty, Alacritty, default Mac terminal, but always come back to iTerm2.
  • Homebrew - Mainly used to install and update CLI tools.
  • fzf - fuzzy finder
  • bat - cat command with syntax highlighting.
  • Meslo - Font with ligature support.

Shell

  • zsh - Just cuz it’s the default on MacOS.
  • Powerlevel10K - Liked the out-of-the-box defaults, so I stuck with it.
  • Antigen - Plugin manager for zsh.

Editor

  • Neovim - Used for making quick text changes.
  • Emacs - Used for anything text related.

Productivity

  • Org Mode - To-do lists.
  • Org-roam - For notes and documents that don’t have/need fancy layouts.
  • iWork - When org-roam isn’t enough.
  • Office 365 - When iWork isn’t enough.

Files

  • Cryptomator - Encrypting files on local or remote.
  • Cyberduck - Tranferring files, supports Cryptomator.
  • Mountain Duck - Mounting remote files, supports Cryptomator.
  • Rclone - Backing up files to the cloud.

Development Tools

  • LSP - Used with Emacs to provide code completion and navigation.
  • Insomnia - REST client.

Selfhosted - Home

Tools that don’t need to be public.

  • Wallabag - Read later.
  • Gitea - Lightweight git version control.
  • Etherpad - For throwaway notes.
  • Pi-hole - Blocking ads and trackers on my home network.
  • Seafile - Dropbox alternative.
  • bitwarden_rs - Password manager.
  • Firefox Sync Server - Instead of syncing to Mozilla’s cloud servers.
  • Wireguard (inbound) - VPN in to access services listed above.
  • Wireguard (outbound) - Traffic flows through an external VPN provider.
  • Postfix & Dovecot - Mail management.
  • ZNC - IRC network bouncer.
  • SingleFile - Archive interesting websites.

Selfhosted - External

Tools hosted at VPSs.

  • Mailcow - Suite of mail-related applications used for personal mail accounts.

Website

  • Hugo - Used WordPress for years, but never used any WordPress-specific funtionality, so I decided to migrate.
  • Vercel - Hosting; free, developer-friendly, supports Hugo and needs no maintance once set up.

Communications

While I do have accounts for Telegram and WhatsApp, I don’t actually use them.

  • Messages - Apple has me locked in here.
  • Signal - Interacting with privacy-conscious friends.
  • Sessions - For the paranoid.
  • Weechat - IRC & Slack
    • wee-slack - easier to navigate with keyboard than Slack apps

Mobile

  • beorg (iOS) - Manage org mode to-do lists.
  • Halide - Best camera app for RAW images.
  • BlackSight - Night-mode camera
  • Overcast - Podcast player with great speed functionality
  • Brain.fm - Audio to get into the flow.
  • Tweetbot - Still the best Twitter app for iOS.
  • NetNewsWire - Open source RSS reader.
  • Slide - Open source reddit browser.
  • Wireguard - Connecting to home network.
  • Solitaire+ - When I need to shut down my brain.
  • SpellTower+ - When I want my brain to use up some energy.