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Uses

I love talking about the tools I use every day to get work done and be productive, and I'm really interested in other people's workflows and setups.

This page is inspired by Wes Bos' project uses.tech, and is my attempt at documenting my preferred tools and how I do things.

I'm constantly improving and upgrading my setup, especially when it comes to software tools and productivity workflows, so expect this to change over time.

Software and services

Productivity tools

  • Todoist helps me organise my personal life and side projects. Here's where I capture all of my tasks — if it's not in Todoist, it's not happening. I really like the fact I can quickly add tasks to my Inbox through a keyboard shortcut without needing to leave what I'm doing and context switch to open the Todoist app, and how I can sort these Inbox tasks out later (I do this daily). Using natural language to schedule tasks is also very handy. But potentially the most useful feature to me is scheduling tasks, i.e. linking a task from your list with a time slot in your calendar. I organise my tasks into different categories/projects including "Life admin", "Recurring", "Long term goals" and then individual categories for each one of my projects.

  • Google Calendar is essential for managing my time and planning my week, tracking appointments and events, staying on top of birthdays and coordinate plans with others. The ability to receive notifications and seamlessly sync across all my devices helps me make sure I never miss anything important.

  • Apple Notes is great for documenting more long term knowledge. Things like recipes, personal goals, or just a general brain dump when I'm on the move. I like that it supports using an Apple Pencil to draft notes which is nice when I want to take handwritten notes on my iPad. I also think it's great that you can share and collaborate on notes with other iCloud users without asking them to sign up to a new service or install any other apps. I looked into many other notes app and, for the time being, Notes does everything I need and more. I also like sticking to the defaults and keeping it simple.

  • Freedom helps me stay focused. I've got a recurring session on both my laptop and phone that runs on a permanent blocklist. If I want to access social media or read the news, I can do so on my iPad. Messaging applications such as Signal and WhatsApp are not blocked on any devices as I still want to be able to reach out to people throughout the day.

  • Magnet for window management, I like being able to use keyboard shortcuts to move windows around.

  • Raycast is MacOS' Swiss army knife and a great replacement for Spotlight. I use it for heaps of different things including searching for files, listing different timezones, managing clipboard history, text expansion/snippets, unit conversion, emoji search and a bunch of other automated tasks. I recently switched to Raycast after having been an Alfred user for the longest time.

  • Dato is extremely helpful for staying on top of timezones. Its time travel feature is brilliant and helps me with figuring out reasonable times for events across timezones.

  • Xnip is a screenshot tool for Mac that supports annotations, blurring sensitive information and scrolling screenshots. It's fast and works quite well. I tried a number of different alternatives but I always find myself coming back to it. The only feature I think it's missing is text recognition/OCR.

  • Loom to record videos or demos. I particularly like how easy it is to edit videos including trimming bits that I don't want to include and stitching clips together. I also think it makes it really easy to share videos and have other people interact with them via timestamped comments. It's a great tool to replace meetings that are not really necessary, and also great for asynchronous collaboration across timezones.

  • PDF Combo is quite handy for combining PDF files, and Lightweight PDF is useful if you ever need to compress a PDF file. I typically use these if I need to submit any government forms/documents when there's a file upload size limit. I typically don't keep these installed all the time as I rarely use them.

Writing

  • iA Writer is my go-to application for writing in markdown format. It has the best UI/UX in my opinion and a number of great features, and most of my writing happens here. Definitely an all-time favourite.

  • Sublime Text remains, after many years, one of my favourite code/text editors. I still use it mostly for notes, I've got a single todo.md file (automatically backed up to iCloud Drive) I use as a brain dump / mental clutter storage where I keep random thoughts that pop up half-way through a task, also for things like taking notes during a meeting/course. Sometimes I also use it to edit very large files (it's very powerful at finding and replacing), to parse and beautify files, etc.

Coding

  • Visual Studio Code is my main code editor. I've got all settings sync'd via GitHub which is quite handy.

  • iTerm2 and pure are my preferred tools for all my terminal needs. Before installing this last one you need to make sure zsh is installed and updated (it should be shipped with MacOS). I also have zsh-syntax-highlighting installed for Fish shell-like syntax highlighting, and currently use the Snazzy colour preset.

  • Homebrew for package management, which also installs MacOS' Command Line Tools and Git.

  • nvm is a must for installing and handling different Node versions locally. I install this using curl as brew is currently unsupported.

  • Sublime Merge is quite handy for things like visually parse diffs, navigating a project's history, or scanning a list of changes to a particular file over time. For anything else I use Git in my terminal.

  • Charles Proxy is very useful to view all of the HTTP(S) traffic between my computer and the Internet, including requests, responses and HTTP headers (which contain cookies and caching information). It's also extremely useful if you need to mock API endpoints to test features locally if your backend is not ready.

Security

  • Bitwarden is my preferred password manager. It works well across devices and have never had any problems with it.

  • Duo is my 2FA client, and it runs only on my phone.

Reading and information organisation

  • NetNewsWire is my preferred RSS reader. It works both on MacOS and iOS and syncs over iCloud.

  • Goodreads helps me track books I've already read or those I want to read. The UI is a bit dated and cluttered, but it gets the job done.

  • Instapaper is my "read later" service, and I use it all the time to keep track of the articles/pages/blog posts I want to get to at some point. Its UI is quite simple and minimal, and it works well for what I need it for.

  • Anki for creating and reviewing flashcards. I mainly use this tool for documenting vocabulary and grammar when learning a new language.

Miscellaneous

  • DuckDuckGo is my browser of choice for all my devices. I'm a huge fan and started using it quite early on. There are still a few features I wish were available and some bugs I'd like fixed, but it's come such a long way since I first used it and I'm already happy to use it every day as my main browser.

  • Spotify for streaming and organising my music library, although I also enjoy brain.fm especially when I want to do some focus work.

Hardware and furniture

  • Dell S2721QS (27 inch 4K UHD Monitor) is my primary 27 inch screen directly in front of me. I only have one external monitor and keep my laptop closed as I like the constraint of needing to use a single screen and handling workspaces.

  • Herman Miller's Aeron Chair is easily the best chair I've used for long hours at my desk. The adjustable lumbar support, breathable mesh, and ergonomic design make a huge difference in staying comfortable throughout the day. It's an investment, but one that has definitely paid off in terms of comfort and taking care of my posture.

  • Omnidesk Pro is my desk which lets me switch between sitting and standing throughout the day. The height adjustment is smooth and easy, and I like that I can save preset heights to switch positions quickly. Having the flexibility to stand helps with focus and reduces fatigue, especially during long stretches of work. The sturdy build and spacious surface also mean I have plenty of room for my setup without feeling cramped.

Away from work

I try to stay away from my laptop after working hours and during weekends.

I always keep a small notepad close for journalling, doodling and brain dumping either when I'm on the go or throughout the day when I'm at home.

I've got an old Kindle I use to read my ebooks, which is particularly convenient when travelling, although lately I've been making use of my local library which is a great way to enjoy physical books without the extra clutter.

When I'm travelling I usually take my iPad with me. Depending on how much space I've got, I also take my Logitech K380 bluetooth keyboard as it's much easier to write with than the on-screen keyboard.

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Last updated: April 2025