The Things They Carried: Kenny

How pretensious is THAT title? Pretty pretensious, right? Let’s move on.

This is a tools pornography post which means I just list out a bunch of tools and we all just start sharing with each other.

There’s a lot of empty calories here but sometimes that’s enjoyable. If you, in turn, write about the tools you use I would love to read it.

Prelude

A couple of weeks ago, while burning a few bridges, I mentioned that I think there are better tools than ExpressionEngine. A lot of people asked, “What are those tools, jerkface? (and where’s that smell of burning wood coming from? the bridge?)”

I offer no alternative at EE’s skill level. I am able to work quicker with frameworks. For a website that needs a nice admin interface I use Django. It’s rare I build those.

Two things in flux

I always have two things in flux, my editor and a task manager. I’m on The Hit List and Sublime Text 2 currently.

I like The Hit List because it lets me create sub tasks and is enjoyable to use. Before The Hit List I used Things, but found their ‘filing’ mechanism clunky.

I like Sublime Text 2 only after I installed a bunch of extra add-ons. It’s tab completion with HTML is particularly nice. It has a vibrant community as well, which is really important to the success of the editor.

I’ve found that these two things really don’t affect net productivity unless you constantly switch them. I use text editors to write things, as well.

Tools I use (in no particular order)

1. Xcode. I’ve started diving into the creation of applications. This is something I’ve wanted to do since I was 12 and I’m really enjoying using Xcode. Jumping from a text editor to an IDE is an enlightening experience. I’m in Xcode every day now.

2. iTunes Match. I went all in with iTunes several years back and we have all Apple stuff at this household, so this made a lot of sense. I still love Rdio, but I love The Beatles more.

3. Gitbox for lower level Git management. When I need to do complex stuff I use terminal. It goes without saying that I use Git, right?

4. Dropbox: because Jesus wants you to use it.

5. Fontcase for when I work with designers.

6. Mindnode Pro for when I need to think broader terms like setting yearly goals.

7. Terminal + Vim: I use this combo a lot, specifically at work, as we work on remote boxes to code.

8. Querious and Base: When given the options I will always choose a more aesthetically pleasing option then the command line and happily pay the licensing fees.

9. Beanstalk for source code. I also use Github and wish Beanstalk had their code review tools, but I love the Beanstalk team and I like what they do. I keep most of my stuff private.

10. Reeder is the best way to use Google Reeder across all of Apple’s platforms.

11. Alfred helps me move around very, very quickly.

12. Kaleidescope for viewing diffs. It integrates easily with Gitbox.

13. Parallels 7. I used to be a VMWare guy but version 7 of Parallels offered better Lion integration, usability and speed.

14. Paperless and a Fujitsu ScanSnap S1300 for trying to be as paperless as possible.

15. An iPad 2 and iPhone for reading and consuming. Instapaper is a must.

16. Soulver as my spreadsheet substitute. Also check out this screencast if you’re interested.

17. Acorn for any imagery I need to manipulate, which is rare.

18. Python, Objective-C and JavaScript are my favorite languages to futz with these days. I still use jQuery, but I’m much more interested in the core mechanics of the language itself, so I’m trying to do things without frameworks for educational purposes.

Fin.

I think that’s about every damn thing I have. So now, when you come to rob me, you’ll at least have realistic expectations.