So I'd love to know, what does your setup look like? What tools hw/sw make you productive?
the hardware i use: a dell latitude E6400 laptop (i like the 14 inch screen) an asus 22' screen (basically any good flatscreen >= 20') very simple external keyboard and mouse. (a standard keyboard layout is important though)
software:
gvim for programming (i love being able to work heavily with the keyboard) ubuntu 10.04 (including evolution mail client, nautilus,...) bash (linux command line, very efficient and on many machines available) virtual box with a win xp installation (for testing IE and photoshop when needed) ietester (a quite good solution for running different versions of IE)
for coding: any computer with vim is good enough, but my main machine is a MBP 15" w/ a 23" flat screen, wireless apple keyboard and mouse. I use the iphone a lot to snap pictures of said paper scribbles but I usually keep them in the iphoto library or upload to goplan. lots of people I know swear by evernote, but I don't get it and as such I don't use it. when in need to do HTML, I start up textmate (although I'm not very impressed with it, it does get the job done in a reasonable ammount of time). nor am I a huge github fan, although it's pretty easy to use.
for management: goplan (http://goplanapp.com) for basic project management, excel for cashflow management, keeping track of generic project stuff, metrics, short term projections, etc. I'm also back to using word a lot to write specs, although I prefered to use Google Wave for that until the specs were closed but as they're shutting it down I stopped using it.
for communications: calling people and email when calling isn't appropriate. call me old fashioned but actually talking to people sorts lots of issues very fast and time is the one thing you'll never get back so I see no point on wasting it.
If I had to elect one single thing as what makes me productive, I'd say it's other people who get their part of the job done, not any hw/sw tools.
- MBP 15" i5 + 22" LCD monitor, using the MacBook keyboard with a magic mouse
- iPhone 3G 16gb. Maybe upgrading in a couple of weeks.
- Moleskine, actually a big fan of this, with many versions on sight.
- Moleskine DD, http://www.zonageek.com/2007/4/23/the-geekster-moleskine
Software:
- Textmate with many bundles to handle the everyday need. Also PeepOpen, works great.
- Terminal, a couple of docked tabs with Visor (http://visor.binaryage.com/) rest with normal windows
- ZSH, Oh My ZSH is a great starting place http://github.com/robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh
- Omnifocus on my iOS devices and desktop
- Github, gity, git
- Evernote, to keep all that matters to me in a handy searchable place
- Dropbox, my favorite sync/backup tool, besides my external harddrives, works great for development.
- Homebrew, easily the nicest and cleanest way to handle software install on your mac.
- RVM, best option if you develop on Ruby or want to use some ruby goodness
Hardware:
- MBP 13" 2.4 with 500gb of HDD. Thinking of upgrading to SSD. At the office I plug this to a 24", mouse and apple keyboard.
- iMac 27" with a 2.8 i7. It also doubles as the home monitor for the MBP when I need to work on code that I may have on the laptop.
- iPhone 3GS 16gb. Don't see a reason to upgrade to 4 yet.
- Textmate+Terminal for most programming work
- Photoshop when I need it
- Omnifocus for GTD and task management
- Goplan for online project management and issue tracking
- Gitbox and GitX when I need a GUI for git. Most often just use my tweaked git log output anyway
- Notational velocity for note keeping
- Dropbox, a personal savior. Syncs all my stuff between machines@work : Dual HP workstations, Core 2 quad.
Mostly vstudio,sqlserver,console,pshell, terminal services, and beyond compare( best license purchase ever, 3 way merge FTW)
oh, and Outlook.