My Software Setup

This post gives a quick overview about the software I run on my PCs. In general, I am looking for keyboard centric tools which follow the UNIX philosophy (doing one thing right). Ideally, the tool integrates well into the terminal because that is where I spend a lot of my computer time - besides the browser maybe.

Operating System

Arch Linux.

I was an Ubuntu user before but switched to Arch Linux since some years now. The rolling release models gives me access to the latest software and I only rarely have any stability issues. Arch also allows me to run my own customized desktop experience without any pre-installed other packages. Additionally, the AUR is a great resource for additional packages.

Window Manager

dwm.

At some point, I took a deep dive into tiling window managers and ended up with dwm. Although it is fairly small program, it provides me with the functionality that i need: tiling, easy on resources, workspaces / tags, multi-monitor support, keyboard centric.

Terminal Emulator

st.

I don’t have a strong opinion here. It just works and I like the suckless philosophy.

Shell

zsh with oh-my-zsh.

It seems like the better Bash to me.

Text editor

Neovim.

I started using Vim in a university project where we had to use a remote server for machine learning tasks via SSH. Since then, I am passionate about Vims modal text editing approach, it makes text editing fun. For ease-of-use I remapped ESC to Caps Lock. Nvim is my editor at work, except when I work on large Java projects where IDEs like Intellij shine.

File manager

lf.

I was using Thunar before, but always wanted for a more terminal centered tool. Most of time I am not using a file manager at all but simply the shell.

Mail

Thunderbird.

Since many years, it does the job for me. Email filters do a great job in keeping your inbox organized.

Browser

Firefox.

Password Manager

pass.

Integrates very nicely with dwm and dmenu and gives me access to my passwords in less than a second.

Note Taking

emacs org-mode.

Before I was taking notes in markdown but realized that I would like some more features. This is my first contact with the emacs world, maybe at some point I will ditch Vim for it? Who knows.

Dotfile Management

git with dotbot.

I use different branches for each laptop to keep the same base configuration.

Snippets

snippy.

A small but powerful script which makes information which I need to share in many places easily available (like address, bank account, …).

Video Player

mpv.

Works great.

RSS Reader

newsboat.

My own newsfeed.

PDF

zathura.

The Vim keybindings and keyboard centric UI make me happy.

Terminal Multiplexer

tmux.

Although I use a tiling manager, sometimes tmux sessions come in very handy and keep my work organized.