One of the most interesting articles or posts to read is what other people use, for things like traveling and computing.
I’m an impressionable sucker; reading about interesting people’s recommendations will sway me.
Here, be swayed.
Computers
- My custom macOS setup
- My custom Windows setup
Codes
- I have most affection for the front-of-the-front-end. Modern HTML, CSS, and JS. I often use React and PHP. My code is semantic, written for accessibility and performance, and crafted thoughtfully. Read more about what I know and don’t know as a developer
- Frameworks or libraries are useful if default languages don’t provide enough. It’s usually difficult to avoid using React/Vue/Svelte, Astro/11ty, or WordPress/Drupal if you want to create a custom site. However, I often enjoy the challenge of native web languages without abstraction.
- A modern front-end design layout starts CSS Custom Properties and a grid, such as CSS Grid and Flexbox, with SVGs, and your preferred server-side rendering language with client-side JS. The ultimate goal for any page is to paint the browser viewport in ~3 seconds.
- I use Visual Studio Code (now a tracking-free version of it called VSCodium) since summer 2017, but I initially could not find the right combination of extensions or shortcuts to beat Sublime Text as a code editor. However, because of momentum, I now usually start with VSCodium.
- I’ll sometimes grab Sublime Text 4 for older projects. Because it’s so fast, it’s an easy one to use for a one off project. These are my settings and packages.
- Classic WordPress is my jam.
Roots is my reference WordPress dev environment.
And I’ll get a little down and dirty with WooCommerce. - I forked the Sage theme into Sage Starter as a static project starter, which requires Node.js, NPM, Gulp, and Bower. It’s a little dusty in the mid-2020s and I’ll need to evaluate what to start using considering WordPress is all in on Gutenberg.
- I learned to write HTML, CSS, and JS on my own since the 90s, assisted by A List Apart, Smashing Magazine, CSS Tricks, Codepen, Wes Bos, javascript.info, udemy.com, ui.dev, and Dmitry Soshnikov among many others
Browsers
Firefox and Brave (with some complications since). I open up Safari as needed. I play with Brave Nightly and Firefox Dev Edition. Tor Browser for privacy. Chrome is dead to me.
For the best experience with Firefox, I am a fan of Arkenfox’s user.js recommendations. Specifically, the extensions recommendations.
- Browser add-ons primary (All available for Firefox, many available for Webkit or Chromium browsers)
- uBlock Origin (I set it with Medium Mode)
- Browser add-ons secondary (I use all of these as well but they aren’t essential)
- uMatrix (as long as it works)
- Bitwarden
- Blur (for Email Masking only, I turn everything else off)
- F.B. Purity For Facebook
- Google Voice
- Keepa – Amazon Price Tracker
- Web Scrobbler
- Pinboard
- Reddit Enhancement Suite
Etcs
- Read privacyguides.org. Ask me questions if anything confuses you.
- Stop using Google as your primary search engine. Use DuckDuckGo. Bang your way to Startpage.com or Google when necessary.
- Mullvad – Virtual Private Networks are necessary. Mullvad is the best and easiest VPN I’ve used and released as open source software. Payment is in Euro instead of Dollars. I use VPNs on most devices at most times.
- Wireguard is the best VPN client out there, better and lighter than OpenVPN.
- I installed Pi-Hole on a RaspberryPi to help with blocking bad URLs. I even route all my network traffic through Pi-Hole and into Mullvad via Wireguard. It’s complicated so I’m writing up how to do it.
- All media edited with Affinity Photo, Figma, or Luminar.
- I try to use Open Source Software when possible.
- I’ve been faithful to VLC for more than a decade. It just works.
- LibreOffice is free and open source, covers most things that Office is, but is slower. Still a good back up.
- memeorandum.com and thehill.com for news, left and right
- Less social media, more indieweb.org. It’s time.