MacBook Air M4 16GB RAM (2025)
The main workhorse.
Browsers
- LibreWolf :: A bit more privacy focused Firefox derivative.
- Safari :: In combination with 1Blocker and Adguard Home.
- Ungoogled Chromium :: For the rare cases where websites don’t work properly in LibreWolf or Safari, and for use by LLMs.
Safari Plugins
- 1Blocker :: Only decent ad and tracker blocker that works on Mac and iOS.
- Vimari :: Navigating using the keyboard only.
- RedirectWeb :: For instances when I want all www.reddit.com links to go to old.reddit.com
LibreWolf Plugins
- uBlock Origin :: Duh.
- Firefox Multi-Account Containers :: Isolating personal vs work
- SingleFile :: Stores a webpage in a single HTML file.
- Easy Screenshot :: For taking full webpage screenshots instead of just what is on the browser screen currently.
- Vimium C :: Navigating using the keyboard only.
- RedirectWeb :: For instances when I want all www.reddit.com links to go to old.reddit.com
Command Line
- Homebrew :: Mainly used to install and update CLI tools. I simply can’t live without it.
- Taproom :: TUI for brew.
- Chezmoi :: Tracking system, shell, application configuration files.
- ddgr :: DuckDuckGo from the terminal.
- doge :: Human readable dig.
- Midnight Commander :: Finder for the terminal. There are better file managers, but mc is the only one that seems to have native ssh/scp functionality.
- tealdeer :: CLI cheatsheets.
- television :: file fuzzy finder
- snitch :: View network connections
- ical :: View iCloud calendars
- llama.cpp :: For a bit of AI usage since you can’t really do much with 16GB RAM.
- rem :: View iCloud reminders
- unifly :: Because Unifi’s UIs give me headaches
Shell
- Ghostty :: Terminal emulator. Honestly I can’t remember why I moved away from iTerm.
- cmux :: Ghostty-based emulator for using with agents.
- zsh :: Just cuz it’s the default on MacOS.
- Starship :: Prompt customizer.
- zoxide :: Faster cd.
Editor
- Helix :: Unlike all the other editors, Helix has the best defaults for me, while being close enough to Vim.
Productivity
- iWork :: When I don’t want the Office bloat.
- Office 365 :: When iWork isn’t enough.
- Devonthink :: My dumping ground for links and files.
Files
- Cryptomator :: Encrypting files on local or remote.
- Cyberduck :: Tranferring files, supports Cryptomator.
- Mountain Duck :: Mounting remote files, supports Cryptomator.
- Rclone :: Backing up files to the server and cloud.
Development Tools
- LSP :: Used with Helix to provide code completion and navigation.
- Insomnia :: REST client.
- Claude Code :: Just like everyone else.
- Pi :: Harness I’m using more and more.
Dell Precision 5820
Server for self-hosting applications and doing backups.
Hardware
The T5820 is old-ish, but a solidly built machine.
- LSI 9200-8e :: For connecting to 8 external SAS drives.
- Nvidia T600 4GB :: For running AI models for IP cameras.
- Sans Digital TR4X :: SAS enclosure for backing up the backups.
Software
- TrueNAS :: OS for server that does backups, virtual machines, and containers.
- nv-monitor :: View Nvidia CPU stats, more pleasant than nvidia-smi.
Selfhosted Home
Tools that don’t need to be public.
- Adguard Home :: Highly configurable ad blocker. Not the best UI, but it works really well. Running multiple instances (personal devices vs streaming devices).
- Technitium :: Recursive DNS server so you don’t need anyone elses DNS, like Cloudflare 8.8.8.8 or Google 1.1.1.1
- Bitwarden & bitwarden_rs :: Password manaager and alternative Bitwarden server implementation.
- Wireguard (inbound) :: VPN in to access services listed above.
- Wireguard (outbound) :: Traffic flows through an external VPN provider.
- Frigate :: IP camera recording and object detection.
- Scrypted :: Simply used as a bridge to get Frigate cameras viewable by HomeKit.
- Bichon :: Archiving emails
- Forgejo :: Private git
- Kiwix-server :: Viewing Wikipeida without going to Wikipedia
- Home Assistant :: For using non-HomeKit devices in Home app
- Cronicle :: Runs checks like CPU and hard drive temperatures as a backup and sends notifications if necessary.
- Audibookshelf :: For retrieving podccasts.
- Immich :: Easily share photos and look at them on AppleTVs and Rokus.
- Yamtrack :: Tracking movies and TV shows I’ve watched and my rating for them.
Selfhosted External
Tools hosted at VPSs.
- Technitium :: Failover recursive DNS server if home instance is unavailable for some reason
- Newsblur :: RSS news reader that lets you filter and train, provides daily summaries, supports newsletters with a bit of tweaking.
Cloud
- Backblaze B2 :: Cloud backup and also used to serve up images for this website through Cloudflare.
- Pushover :: For sending notifications to phone. Used for long running shell commands or in Claude.
Website
- Astro + Starlight :: Replaced Hugo because I wanted something a big more flexible.
- Cloudflare :: Hosting; free, developer-friendly, supports Astro and needs no maintance once set up.
Communications
While I do have WhatsApp, I don’t actually use t.
- Messages :: Apple has me locked in here.
- Signal :: Interacting with privacy-conscious family and friends.
- Telegram :: For some reason a lot of AI agents natively support Telegram and provide tight integrations.
iPhone 16 Pro Max
Apps
- Halide :: Best camera app for RAW images.
- Kino :: Easy video recording from the makers of Halide
- Podcasts :: Built-in transcript functionality is useful for scanning episodes.
- Wireguard :: Connecting to home network.
- Solitaire+ :: When I need to shut down my brain.
- SpellTower+ :: When I want my brain to use up some energy.
- Multi-Scrobbler :: Tracking Apple Music scrobbling.
- SmartTube :: For YouTube but with ad blocking
- Shortcuts :: Lots and lots, like modifying text, text/character counters, toggling noise cancellation. Basically, it if takes more than 2 clicks, I’ll try to create a shortcut for it.
- Audiobooth :: Listening to podcasts retrieved by Audiobookshelf.
Previously used
Powerline ::Replaced with Starship.Emacs ::Nothing wrong with Emacs but just needed a change.Seafile ::I realized I didn’t really need my files to be accessible. For backups, I use external HDs.BlackSight ::Not sure why, but I simply don’t take many photos anymore. Everyone else does, so I can get a copy if needed.Org Mode ::Haven’t set it up in Neovim yet. Will probably go back to it eventually.Org-Roam ::Wasn’t using it much in the first place and I’m not sure if there is something similar for Neovim.Pi-hole ::Found to be slow for some reason. Replaced with Adguard Home.Hugo ::used WordPress for years, but never used any WordPress-specific funtionality, so I decided to migrate.MacBook Pro (2016) ::Was getting ooooold. Not really. The problem was I couldn’t use any of the recent versions of Mac OS. OCLP is great and all, but the little quirks were getting to me.iPad Pro 10.5” (2017) ::Once I got the Macbook Air, there was no use case for the iPad.iPhone XS ::Not getting updates anymore is problematic.Mac Mini (Late 2014) x2 ::Wanted to consolidate and do more.Arc ::Don’t want to use a critical tool like a browser that is no longer being developed.Warp ::Too many little quirks.Wave ::Also too many quirks.Neovim ::Spent too much time fiddling with configuration.Overcast ::Perfectly fine, but the built-in Podcast app works fine now.Nvidia K2200 ::Needed more powerful video card for IP camera object detection.LSI 9300-8e ::HBA that ran way too hot.iTerm ::Don’t know why I changed.Mailcow ::Hosting email wasn’t that difficult, but I stopped for a couple of reason. First, I barely send or receive emails nowadays. I aggresively unsubscribe to newsletters or send them to spam. Newsletters I am interested in get funneled to Newsblur. Second, everyone I email or receive emails from uses the usual big email services, all guarenteed to be not private.ollama ::Replaced by llama.cpp just to change things up.Marvis ::Mainly used to track Apple Music scrobbling.
