Uses

I've been in search of the perfect setup at home for a little while now. This is where I'm at right now:

My desk, a bamboo top with a 27 inch monitor, and a laptop perched on top of a book. You can also see on the desk a notepad, a pink pencil cup, a stream deck, a mint green timer clock, a wireless phone charger, a pink mug on top of a yellow coaster. Attached to the desk are a big rectangular keylight and a microphone on a boom arm. Behind the desk you can see some colourful paper bunting on the wall.

🖥 Hardware

My chair is a Herman Miller Aeron and my desk is a Fully Jarvis Bamboo Standing Desk. Getting a standing desk after a year of working remotely was an absolute game changer, I'm so happy with it! I also have an anti-fatigue mat that I got with my desk and it really helps me stand for longer 🧍‍♀️

I spend most of my time on my 2021 16" MacBook Pro. I generally use it open and my current monitor stand is a pristine (a.k.a. unread) copy of cracking the code interview 😂 I've now ditched the superultrawide lifestyle, and my current monitor is an Apple Studio Display.

As it turns out I have a bunch of accessories 😅

For pointing, I tend to switch between an Apple Magic Trackpad 2 and a Logitech MX Master 3 for Mac cause it helps keep my RSI in check.

For calls, I'm using my monitor's built in camera (despite the 🥔 quality) and I have a Elgato Key Light to help with lighting. Audio wise I use my 2nd Gen Airpods Pro and an Elgato Wave 3.

I run Tech Nottingham online events from here occasionally, so I also have an Elgato StreamDeck and an Elgato Collapsible Green Screen; they're super helpful for those.

I have a couple more bits and bobs on my desk, like a wireless charger, a rotating pen cup and a cute pastel terrazzo coaster.

As for portable stuff, I have an iPhone 13 Pro Max, an Apple Watch Series 6, and an 12.9" M1 iPad Pro which I love ✨

⌨️ Keyboards

I got my first mechanical keyboard a couple of years ago, and I just fell in love with them 💛

Here's some deets on the ones I have so far 👀

WASD v3

Board: WASD v3
Switches: Cherry MX Clear
Cable: Rose Pink Sleeved (ordered with the keyboard)
Keycaps: I made the layout myself, you can get it here.

Note: Some of the letters have started to rub off.

A white mechanical keyboard, with white, pink, and dark grey keycaps. The font on the keycaps is curly and italic. A bunch of the keys have space themed icons.

Ergodox EZ

Board: ErgoDox EZ
Switches: ~~Kaihl Copper~~ Banana Splits
Cable: The Curled One (Cream Fuchsia Diamonds) - Clark Kable
Keycaps: Astrolokeys

A white mechanical keyboard, split in two, with white, pink, yellow and purple keycaps in an astrological theme.

DZ60RGB

Note: The keycaps didn't perfectly match the PCB layout, and because of their slanted profile, it was difficult to use them in different places. In future, I'd probably either try to match the layouts or get a DSA profile keycap set, so they're easier to move around.

A compact 60% mechanical keyboard, with a transparent acrylic case, and rainbow side printed keycaps.

Logitech POP Keys

Board: Logitech POP Keys

A 60% wireless keyboard with round keycaps. The board is mint green and lilac, and the keys are white and yellow.

Note: this is my first off the shelf mechanical keyboard and while it's not quite as nice as my other keyboards, the convenience of the multi channel Bluetooth is top tier.

Keychron K8

I got this one from work and it's a great keyboard! It's got multi channel bluetooth and pretty nice backlighting, I've been using it quite a lot.

Board: Keychron K8
Switches: Gateron Brown

A tenkeyless wireless keyboard with dark grey keycaps, except for the escape key which is orange. The board has RGB backlighting, which is glinting different colours under each key.

💾 Software

Editor

A screenshot of VSCode, the theme is purple with yellow, pink and red fonts in places. The font is a modern looking monospace.

I use VS Code for everything! My theme is Nebula and the font is Latin Modern Mono. I have a bunch of extensions, these are my faves:

Indent rainbow: makes your indents pretty, and more importantly, highlights when your indent level isn't quite right.
WebHint + Error Lens: a killer combo that gives you instant feedback on the web code you write.
GitLens: super useful to get context on when the line was last changed; the commit message helps understand the intent and the name helps you figure out who to ask about it 🕵🏼‍♀️
Read time: I like including read time on my blog posts, so it's helpful to have it right in VS Code.
Glitch: if you use Glitch for little projects, this lets you edit your remote Glitches from your local editor ✨
Gremlins tracker: this is useful to find "non standard" characters when you're debugging a weird issue.

Terminal

A screenshot of iTerm2, the theme is dark blue, and the prompt is a random emoji, followed by folder and git indicators, and followed by a colourful chevron.

I use the integrated terminal on VSCode most of the time, but when I'm not doing repo specific stuff, I use iTerm2. My theme is called Galaxy and I use Latin Modern Mono here too.

For my shell I use ZSH with Oh My Zsh, as it has a bunch of plugins and useful aliases out of the box. My shell theme is called miloshadzic.

I try to keep it light on the plugins since they can slow down startup a bunch, but I find these two really helpful:

Apps

There's a bunch of apps I use regularly, but the ones I always install first in a fresh machine are Alfred, Magnet and Hand Mirror.

I write and organise everything in Notion.

And here a few apps that I use less often, but are really good at what they do: