Ask HN: Tools of the trade
20 comments
Mine:
Windows Server
ASP.NET
Github Desktop
SVN
Visual Studio
Brackets - awesome text editor with
JavaScript syntax checking
and undefined variable checking
Jenkins
Octopus Deploy
Stripe.com
Red Gate SQL Source Control
Keen.io - not affiliated
but wanted to plug since has been coolest thing recently
awesome, easy analytics (paid but
free plan has 50k events/mo and
we've stayed under that so far)My tools changed quite a bit this year. I am using:
I think I might have been the last person on the planet to figure out that an iPad with a bluetooth keyboard in a coffee shop or library is a very productive work setup and that I do not need to lug my laptop everywhere.
We are living in a fantastic era and I just cannot believe the amazing free tools that are available for things like network analysis (NetworkX) and spatial visualization (ggmap).
emacs
textmate2
R
python / pandas
jupyter notebooks (python, R, julia kernels)
c++
Clojure
Common Lisp
linux on the server
os x on my laptop
ipad / prompt2 / pythonista / bluetooth keyboard
I think I might have been the last person on the planet to figure out that an iPad with a bluetooth keyboard in a coffee shop or library is a very productive work setup and that I do not need to lug my laptop everywhere.
We are living in a fantastic era and I just cannot believe the amazing free tools that are available for things like network analysis (NetworkX) and spatial visualization (ggmap).
I am essentially using:
*Development*:
URxvt-unicode
vim on Linux
Sublime Text 3 on Windows
Python (and a lot of libs, mainly, requests, Flask, AutobahnPython, Twisted)
Rust (my new shiny tool)
C/C++ (sometimes, but I try to avoid it)
Frontend JavaScript (It has been a long time since I've written some ES5, I write only ES6 thanks to Babel)
Node.js
Webpack
React.js
Crossbar.io
Git + GitHub
Zsh (prezto framework)
Fish (on servers sometimes)
tmux (a.k.a the productivity booster)
virtualenvwrapper (must-have for Python & virtualenv)
nvm (must-have for Node.js & NPM)
rvm (must-have for Ruby)
fasd (when cd isn't enough, j somewhere)
*Fonts*:
Monoid whenever I can.
Source Code Pro.
Else, whatever can do the job.
*OSes*:
Debian on Server
Archlinux, Debian, Windows 7 on laptop (1st, fallback on others...)
I try to use the most appropriated OS for containers (Docker)
*Services*:
PostgreSQL OR RethinkDB whenever I can. SQLite when I can't.
Redis
Docker (+ dockercli)
Docker-Compose
nginx
*SaaS*:
Slack
Inbox
TweetDeck
Asana
Hacker News (the worst one :c)When my startup was <10 people, I used Vim and Git a whole heck of a lot.
Now that we're almost 140 people, I mostly use Gmail, Google Calendar, Sublime Text and Evernote, and Google Hangouts for engineering meetings. But, a lot of those people are using Vim and Git, so it's not all bad. :-)
Of course, we all use Anaconda Python.
Oh, and I read a whole lot less Hacker News.
Now that we're almost 140 people, I mostly use Gmail, Google Calendar, Sublime Text and Evernote, and Google Hangouts for engineering meetings. But, a lot of those people are using Vim and Git, so it's not all bad. :-)
Of course, we all use Anaconda Python.
Oh, and I read a whole lot less Hacker News.
Some of mine:
JetBrains' WebStorm
Node.js
MongoDB
Redis
MySQL
MyCLI
Git
GitLab (Hosted and Self-Hosted)
Gulp
FireBug
Trello
Slack
CircleCI or Travis, depending on the project
WakaTime
I made a toolbox which includes tools from "Tools of the trade"/"Show HN". Glad to hear suggestions on how to make it (more) useful.
http://www.hackertoolbox.com/
http://www.hackertoolbox.com/
Ok, let me make a start. This is what I use:
Debian
Apache
MySql
PHP
VIM
99designs
Upwork
GitHub
webpagetest.org
Google PagespeedInsights
Google AnalyticsHaskell for large things
Ruby for small things
Java to earn a living (with a bit of Ruby here and there)
(I'm currently evaluating Kotlin and Javascript as well)
.
OpenBSD on the server
Ubuntu for developing
.
Android Studio (IntelliJ) for Java
Atom with Vim Mode (and a thousand other plugins that turn it into an OS similar to how I imagine emacs) for everything else
.
Github
Ruby for small things
Java to earn a living (with a bit of Ruby here and there)
(I'm currently evaluating Kotlin and Javascript as well)
.
OpenBSD on the server
Ubuntu for developing
.
Android Studio (IntelliJ) for Java
Atom with Vim Mode (and a thousand other plugins that turn it into an OS similar to how I imagine emacs) for everything else
.
Github
Vim
Perl
Bash
make
Go
vim-go plugin
Chrome Developer Tools
libsass
uglifyjs
homebrew
redis
postgresql
Gimp
Dropbox
Google Docs
Google Calendar
Trello
Slack
bitbucket.org
startssl
I use:
vim on Darwin.
javascript es6.
chrome canary
chromestatus.com
chrome apps apis.
gae
managed vm
docker
gce
python
brainUbuntu
VIM
Git
Chef / Mina
Rails / Django
React / jQuery
Digital Ocean
Freckle
Asana
Various APIs including Twilio, Stripe, MusicBrainz, Amazon, Shopify.
That's most of my professional and/or serious side projects, and then I dabble in other stacks when I can. Clojure lately.
Various APIs including Twilio, Stripe, MusicBrainz, Amazon, Shopify.
That's most of my professional and/or serious side projects, and then I dabble in other stacks when I can. Clojure lately.
Search HN for previous years' 'Tools of the Trade' gems:
https://hn.algolia.com/?q=%22Tools+of+the+Trade%22
https://hn.algolia.com/?q=%22Tools+of+the+Trade%22
https://github.com/cjbarber/ToolsOfTheTrade
Last merge was 2 months ago but it has 32 outstanding PRs so maybe he abandoned it.
Last merge was 2 months ago but it has 32 outstanding PRs so maybe he abandoned it.
Sublime Text
LinqPad
VS 2012
SQLServer 2008
SVN
Windows 7 terminator/iTerm
vagrant
travis
tmux
Twisted
ELKI'm mainly focused on web apps so:
VS Online/Visual Studio, Adobe Brackets, Git
C#: IIS, ASP.NET, Node.js JavaScript: vanilla, jquery, Knockout.js
The modern browser matrix & related built-in "dev tools"
VS Online/Visual Studio, Adobe Brackets, Git
C#: IIS, ASP.NET, Node.js JavaScript: vanilla, jquery, Knockout.js
The modern browser matrix & related built-in "dev tools"
Google Docs, OneNote, HipChat, Jira, TerminalOne, TapAnalytics
Slate
Vim
Vimium w/ Chrome
IntelliJ
Docker
Redis
MySQL
Elasticsearch
Slack
GoTo Metting
Jira
Confluence
Git
GitHub
Vim
Vimium w/ Chrome
IntelliJ
Docker
Redis
MySQL
Elasticsearch
Slack
GoTo Metting
Jira
Confluence
Git
GitHub
Well, I guess I'll go from the ground up in each category.
---
For development machines, I have a company-supplied Macbook Air for work and a variety of laptops and desktops that I use for personal things. The Macbook runs OS X Yosemite. My personal machines almost invariably run GNU/Linux (I've been especially fond of Slackware lately) or OpenBSD. My primary rig has a 122-key Unicomp Model M keyboard and a Logitech M570 trackball mouse, along with two monitors (one 1680x1050, one 1440x900); my desk at work has a 2560x1440 Thunderbolt display, connected to one USB port of which are a Logitech K570 solar-powered keyboard (Mac model) and a Logitech M570 trackball mouse (I really do love these trackball mice).
My primary editor as of late is Emacs. My workflow revolves heavily around fiplr for fuzzy-searching and Magit for git repo management (on Linux / OpenBSD, at least; on OS X I use GitX).
Git is currently my VCS of choice, though this is more out of necessity (since the vast majority of the projects I work on are hosted on GitHub, be they public or private repos; I use Bitbucket somewhat as well, so I've been looking a little bit into Mercurial lately, but I've yet to really use it for real work).
My dayjob revolves around Ruby on Rails programming. As a result, common Ruby-related tools (in addition to, of course, Ruby itself) - particularly RVM and globally-installed versions of Bundler, gemr, and Rails 4 (mostly for the various generators, though I don't really use those a whole lot) - are installed on most of my machines, including the Macbook. My job is more geared toward system administration and backend programming, so I've yet to explicitly install common frontend-development tools (like Node, bower, grunt, etc.) on very many of my machines, but I do have them installed on the Macbook as a precaution.
When it comes to building personal projects, my go-to languages have been Ruby (without Rails; I'm more a Sinatra/Padrino fan) and Elixir (recently with Sugar, which I find to be much friendlier to use than Phoenix). I maintain some private Erlang and Elixir Slackbuilds to that effect in order to track the latest versions of both on my Slackware machines (the Erlang on Slackbuilds.org tends to be slow to update, and AFAIK there's no Elixir Slackbuild at all yet); I've yet to publish them, but probably will in time. I've previously used a lot of Perl in my projects, but other than CPAN, I rarely use any Perl-specific tooling.
For databases, SQLite and PostgreSQL are my go-tos; I stay clear of NoSQL databases (except perhaps CouchDB or Mnesia), since I don't feel that they offer anything compelling over Postgres for my needs.
When it comes to the minimal frontend work I do, I generally steer clear of Javascript; when I do need to delve into JS, I've found Mootools to be nice for my uses. I've been using Yahoo's "Pure" CSS framework for things like menu bars and grids, and I've been quite happy with it so far.
---
Going into servers, my software stack tends to stick to Slackware or OpenBSD. My mail server runs OpenBSD with OpenSMTPD and a mail pipeline that includes SpamAssassin, spamd, and ClamAV. Meanwhile, for web servers, I generally go with either Nginx or OpenBSD's httpd (depending on whether the server runs Slackware or OpenBSD), along with PostgreSQL and one or more language runtimes (usually Ruby, Elixir, or Perl, inclusively, as described above). I don't really use any sort of config management system (like Chef or Puppet) on my personal servers; I prefer to configure them individually, using Emacs' TRAMP to edit configuration files over SSH.
---
I do some general electronics repair, too, on my free time. I thus carry around a physical toolbox in my truck with at least basic tools and parts (screwdrivers (particularly my really nice ratcheting screwdriver with a bunch of electronics-specific bits), spare USB/ethernet/power/SATA/etc. cables, wire strippers, soldering iron w/ solder, electrical tape, duct tape, crimpers, spare RJ-45 connectors, heatshrink tubing, zip ties for cable management, anti-static strap, multimeter, some spare PCI peripherals (including a spare dial-up modem card; you never know when you need to fix someone's dial-up), extra keyboards and mice, bag of spare jumpers, spare flashlight (in addition to the one in my glovebox), some sticks of DDR and DDR2 RAM, various AV cables, speaker wire, the works). I have a more thorough superset at home, and a thinner subset at work.
---
... I think that about covers everything.
---
For development machines, I have a company-supplied Macbook Air for work and a variety of laptops and desktops that I use for personal things. The Macbook runs OS X Yosemite. My personal machines almost invariably run GNU/Linux (I've been especially fond of Slackware lately) or OpenBSD. My primary rig has a 122-key Unicomp Model M keyboard and a Logitech M570 trackball mouse, along with two monitors (one 1680x1050, one 1440x900); my desk at work has a 2560x1440 Thunderbolt display, connected to one USB port of which are a Logitech K570 solar-powered keyboard (Mac model) and a Logitech M570 trackball mouse (I really do love these trackball mice).
My primary editor as of late is Emacs. My workflow revolves heavily around fiplr for fuzzy-searching and Magit for git repo management (on Linux / OpenBSD, at least; on OS X I use GitX).
Git is currently my VCS of choice, though this is more out of necessity (since the vast majority of the projects I work on are hosted on GitHub, be they public or private repos; I use Bitbucket somewhat as well, so I've been looking a little bit into Mercurial lately, but I've yet to really use it for real work).
My dayjob revolves around Ruby on Rails programming. As a result, common Ruby-related tools (in addition to, of course, Ruby itself) - particularly RVM and globally-installed versions of Bundler, gemr, and Rails 4 (mostly for the various generators, though I don't really use those a whole lot) - are installed on most of my machines, including the Macbook. My job is more geared toward system administration and backend programming, so I've yet to explicitly install common frontend-development tools (like Node, bower, grunt, etc.) on very many of my machines, but I do have them installed on the Macbook as a precaution.
When it comes to building personal projects, my go-to languages have been Ruby (without Rails; I'm more a Sinatra/Padrino fan) and Elixir (recently with Sugar, which I find to be much friendlier to use than Phoenix). I maintain some private Erlang and Elixir Slackbuilds to that effect in order to track the latest versions of both on my Slackware machines (the Erlang on Slackbuilds.org tends to be slow to update, and AFAIK there's no Elixir Slackbuild at all yet); I've yet to publish them, but probably will in time. I've previously used a lot of Perl in my projects, but other than CPAN, I rarely use any Perl-specific tooling.
For databases, SQLite and PostgreSQL are my go-tos; I stay clear of NoSQL databases (except perhaps CouchDB or Mnesia), since I don't feel that they offer anything compelling over Postgres for my needs.
When it comes to the minimal frontend work I do, I generally steer clear of Javascript; when I do need to delve into JS, I've found Mootools to be nice for my uses. I've been using Yahoo's "Pure" CSS framework for things like menu bars and grids, and I've been quite happy with it so far.
---
Going into servers, my software stack tends to stick to Slackware or OpenBSD. My mail server runs OpenBSD with OpenSMTPD and a mail pipeline that includes SpamAssassin, spamd, and ClamAV. Meanwhile, for web servers, I generally go with either Nginx or OpenBSD's httpd (depending on whether the server runs Slackware or OpenBSD), along with PostgreSQL and one or more language runtimes (usually Ruby, Elixir, or Perl, inclusively, as described above). I don't really use any sort of config management system (like Chef or Puppet) on my personal servers; I prefer to configure them individually, using Emacs' TRAMP to edit configuration files over SSH.
---
I do some general electronics repair, too, on my free time. I thus carry around a physical toolbox in my truck with at least basic tools and parts (screwdrivers (particularly my really nice ratcheting screwdriver with a bunch of electronics-specific bits), spare USB/ethernet/power/SATA/etc. cables, wire strippers, soldering iron w/ solder, electrical tape, duct tape, crimpers, spare RJ-45 connectors, heatshrink tubing, zip ties for cable management, anti-static strap, multimeter, some spare PCI peripherals (including a spare dial-up modem card; you never know when you need to fix someone's dial-up), extra keyboards and mice, bag of spare jumpers, spare flashlight (in addition to the one in my glovebox), some sticks of DDR and DDR2 RAM, various AV cables, speaker wire, the works). I have a more thorough superset at home, and a thinner subset at work.
---
... I think that about covers everything.
[deleted]
So I rolled up my sleeves and made an account to start one :)
What are the tools that you use nowadays?