Recently I switched to a new laptop and had to set it up This comic describes my setup pretty accurately. My setup includes a bunch of small apps I found over the years. It seems that most people are not aware of these, so I decided to share a list.
All of them are free (with the exception of TotalFinder), and if you like them, consider donating to authors.
So here they are in the alphabetical order:
AppCleaner link
AppCleaner is a small application which allows you to thoroughly uninstall unwanted apps.
CopyClip link
Simple clipboard manager, stores what you copied allowing you to quickly find it.
HapticKey link
This is a weird one. I already ranted about the touch bar, and this app makes it a little bit more bearable. Tapping on touch bar will make your trackpad vibrate(?!) to give you haptic feedback. Give it a try and decide for yourself.
Itsycal link
If you ever were annoyed by the fact Mac has no built-in calendar in the menu bar, you’ll love Itsycal. It is a tiny calendar with option to show your calendar events.
By default it displays small calendar icon, with current date in it.
Custom date formats are supported as well, allowing you replace Mac’s clock completely.
Spectacle link
Simple window manager - move windows around, across workspaces, resize them. All that by using using customizable global shortcuts.
The Unarchiver link
Well, this is probably the I just realized Unarchiver was acquired by MacPaw, hopefully they’ll keep it free and simple. on this list. Unarchiver does exactly what it’s name suggests. It supports all of the archive formats you’ll ever need.
TotalFinder ($12.00) link
I always felt Finder is missing a lot of features. TotalFinder and XtraFinder both fix that to an extent, by adding things like tabs, dual mode, cut and more.
There is a catch - both application require system tweak to install. You need to disable System Integrity Protection (don’t worry, you can enable it once app is installed).
XtraFinder link
Pretty similar to TotalFinder, but free. I had some problems with it long ago (can’t remember what it was) so I switched to TotalFinder. Haven’t used in a long time, but you may want to give it a try.
Requires same system tweak as TotalFinder.
Bash
As a bonus here are my two favorite bash tools.
Bash-it link
This is a clone of oh-my-zsh for bash. Includes autocompletion, themes, aliases, custom functions and more. I have been using for a few years now and migrating my config to every new machine I use.
autojump link
This is pure awesomeness.
autojump is a faster way to navigate your filesystem. It works by maintaining a database of the directories you use the most from the command line.
Using provided j command, you can jump around filesystem using fuzzy search. Autojump is smart, and it will favorize directories you visit more frequently.
For example j stanko will take me to my blog directory (/Users/stanko/stanko.github.io) instead of my home folder (/Users/stanko) because I navigate to the prior one more often.
Note that directories must be visited first before they can be jumped to.
Hopefully some of these will make your daily workflow easier.
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