Tools I use, and other things I recommend.
I get asked a lot about the things I use to build software, stay productive, or buy to fool myself into thinking I’m being productive when I’m really just procrastinating. Here’s a big list of all of my favorite stuff.
Task Management
Workstation
16" MacBook Pro, M4 Max, 32GB RAM (2024)
This thing is an absolute beast. The M4 Max is a monster of a chip and the 32GB of RAM means I can run all the things I need to run without ever worrying about resource pressure.
Development
VSCode
My primary code editor. I use the 'Vim' extension to get my vim bindings, but overall there's just way too many tools and features which are difficult to miss out on.
Vim / NeoVim
My swiss army knife for editing text in a variety of different environments. Learning to speak the vim language has been one of the most powerful things I've ever done as a developer.
Ghossty
I'm honestly not even sure what features I get with this that aren't just part of the macOS Terminal but it's what I use.
Lefthook
Git hooks are a powerful way to automate repetitive tasks and Lefthook makes it dead simple to set up and manage those hooks across a variety of different languages.
Design
Figma
We started using Figma as just a design tool but now it's become our virtual whiteboard for the entire company. Never would have expected the collaboration features to be the real hook.
AI Tools
Claude Pro
The best AI assistant I've found for helping me write, brainstorm, and think through problems. The ability to manage projects and login to 'Claude Code' without being charged on usage makes it a great overall choice for tons of different use cases.