Here’s a little trend for 2023 that’s going around: listing out the default apps (and tools!) that I’ve used in 2023. I enjoy this little go around, as I’ve been getting to discover new apps that I might want to try.

I also did something similar last year, but in a much more limited capacity.

• 📨 Mail client:
  • Personal: Apple Mail – I’m transitioning my personal life away from GMail and Google services. Who knows if Apple is actually better from a privacy standpoint, but I already pay for iCloud and own my own domain. It has worked will for the past half of this year.
  • Work: Gmail, but saved to the Dock through Safari.

• 📮 Mail server: (see also Mail client)

  • Personal: iCloud Mail
  • Work: Gmail

• 📆 Calendar: (see also Mail client)

  • Personal: Apple Calendar – fits with the whole moving away from Google thing.
  • Work: Google Calendar – Again, I don’t have a choice on this, but I do have the app saved to Dock

• 📝 Notes: Notion

  I had a lot of hesitation with Notion until I was forced to use it through work. I would prefer an open source alternative, but none have as powerful of database features as Notion does and I’m making heavy use of them.

  I was previously trying to use Nextcloud to handle notes and many other things, but the web UI is slow and painfully cumbersome.

• ✅ To-Do:

  • Personal: Notion – with heavy use of database tables and ability to cross-link items to other pages in Notion really helps me keep track of what I’ve got going on.
  • Open source: GitHub issues
  • Work: Shortcut – I dislike this tool almost as much as JIRA. It gets too complicated as soon as managers, project managers, compliance, and legal start adding requirements.

• 📷 Photo Shooting: iPhone 13 Pro

• 🎨 Photo Editing: None

• 📁 Cloud file storage: NextCloud

  I keep this privately hosted. It’s nice to know that my files are actually my files. I also have quite a few local backups.

• 📖 RSS: NextCloud News

• 🙍🏻‍♂️ Contacts: Apple Contacts

• 🌐 Browser: Arc

• 💬 Chat:

  • Messages – SMS/texts and iMessage
  • Slack – Both for work and the local BendJS meetup group.
  • Signal – Because privacy matters

• 🔖 Bookmarks: Arc

• 📑 Read It Later: Arc, recently Notion Web Clipper

• 📜 Word Processing: VSCode, Markdown, Notion

• 📈 Spreadsheets: If I really need to do some complex manipulation, Google Sheets, but I’m equally or more likely to write a script with Node.js and process JSON files.

• 📊 Presentations:

  • Personal: I haven’t given any talks or presentations in a few years. I’d like to get back into it, but I haven’t found the right fit.
  • Work: Google Sheets

• 🛒 Shopping Lists: Notion

• 🍴 Meal Planning: Notion

• 💰 Budgeting and Personal Finance: N/A (😬)

• 📰 News: RSS, Reddit, Mastodon

• 🎵 Music: Plexamp

  I have a very large library of music collected over more than two decades. I just can’t let go of the super rare albums and EPs that will never be on any of the cloud services.

• 🎤 Podcasts: None. I can’t pay attention to podcasts and do anything else at the same time.

• 🔐 Password Management: 1Password

• 🧑‍💻 Code Editor: VSCode

  I reluctantly gave up trying to continue using Sublime Text. It took me 4 tries over nearly as many months to get VSCode configured in a way that didn’t feel overly intrusive. There are still a lot of quirks about it that I don’t like, but being on the same editor as those I work with has been really helpful.

• ✈️ VPN: OpenVPN

Bonus

• 🚀 Launcher: Alfred

  I bought a “Mega Supporter” Powerpack license years ago. I’ve had free upgrades for years and never a single complaint.

• 🎥 Screen recording: Screenflick

• ☕️ No sleep: KeepingYouAwake

  Don’t tell your IT/security team about this. When you work from home and work requires and resets your screensaver/sleep timeout down to 5 minutes, waking up and logging into your computer can be a nuisance when you make frequent kitchen & bathroom breaks. This little gem can keep your computer active for hours – no mouse jiggler required.

• 🪟 Window organization: Moom

  I’ve bound a bunch of custom keyboard shortcuts for organizing windows across my screen(s). This has been a staple of my productivity toolchain for years.