Setting up a new MacBook Pro for Development

Sunday, February 07 2010 16 Comments

At my new job, I’m using a 15” MacBook Pro.  It’s a really beautiful machine.  I got it on Friday night just before the iPhone Dev Camp last weekend, and I stayed up until 3AM getting it all set up.

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I’ll be using this machine for:

  • iPhone Development
  • .NET Development
  • Rails Development
  • General Office Use (Email, calendar)
  • Working on the book

Here’s how I have mine set up.  I’ve categorized each section.  I’ve also indicated where tools are free versus paid with a ($) symbol.

General

  • git
  • svn
  • Skype
  • Pandora (I pay to get the player & higher quality stream)
  • Dropbox (awesome folder sync between Mac, Windows & iPhone)
  • The Hit List ($) (the best to-do app I’ve ever seen)
  • CyberDuck (FTP client – also good is Transmit ($), but haven’t bought it yet)
  • S3Hub (Amazon S3)
  • Espresso ($) (super-polish HTML editor)
    • also need to buy CSSEdit ($), which is really nice
  • Pomodoro app (just trying this out as a means of focusing)
  • Backup:  Carbonite ($).  (Unlimited online backup. I’ve used both Carbonite and Mozy, and while both have pissed me off in the past, I’m back at Carbonite again)
  • Office Mac ($)
  • iWork ($) – liking this much more than Office, mostly because of Keynote
  • OmniGraffle ($) – This seriously kicks Visio’s butt
  • Google Notifier
  • FreeRuler (a pixel ruler is always handy)
  • KeePassX (handy password manager)
  • MarsEdit – for blogging (probably not going to buy this one, as Windows Live Writer is so much better.  I’ve also tried Blogo & ecto and don’t care for them either)
  • Evernote – still trying to work this into my daily routine.  Right now it holds software keys, scanned receipts, and important documents.
  • QuickSilver – quick app launch & more
  • Camtasia Mac ($) – for screencasting
  • LittleSnapper ($) – nice screenshot / annotation tool, automatically uploads to ember.
  • Picturesque ($) – Awesome image effects at the flick of your mouse
  • Tweetie ($/ads) – lightweight, sleek, twitter client 
  • Yammer – for internal twitter-like chat

iPhone Work

  • Xcode with iPhone SDK 3.1
  • Xcode with iPhone SDK 3.2 Beta (for iPad)
  • AppViz ($) (checks my sales)
  • iPhone Simulator Cropper (for taking nice screenshots in the simulator)
  • HTTPClient (Good for debugging raw HTTP traffic)

.NET Work

Rails Development

Book

  • Microsoft Office 2007 (in the VM)
    • I could use a different template, but my co-authors are all on Windows, and the macros & styles don’t all work properly in Office for Mac.
  • Darkroom (for focusing on text)

Extra

  • In my Windows 7 VM, I’ve installed Steam so I can try to see how playable games are within the VM.  I didn’t expect much, but Torchlight is surprisingly playable.  On my Mac desktop I’ve used Crossover Games and with that Team Fortress 2 plays like butter.

What am I missing?

I’m considering Pixelmator ($) for my occasional Photoshop ($$$) fix.

Are there any killer apps that I’m missing?  I’m always on the lookout for new apps that can help me be productive.

#1 Paul Squyres avatar
Paul Squyres
2.07.2010
10:55 AM

Useful apps I have on my Macs....

Hyperspaces (Must have app if you use spaces (Until Apple desides to give us different desktop backgrounds). It runs on top of spaces and provides different backgrounds for all your spaces)

iStat Menus (Just because I like to see a dashboard on the top menu bar for system utilization).

Sidenote (cool elegant slide out note drawer for your desktop)

Screenflow (prefer it over camtasia)

iToner (custom ringtones for iphone, now that you have a mac - without any hacks...(did I just say hack!?!)

CCC (carbon copy cloner) (easy, powerful hd cloning tool: it saved me twice!)

Textmate or CSSEdit

Aperture (Apple’s professional photography app: sweet interface and works really well with RAW)

Noise (if you are in a busy work environment - white noise generator)

...Darkroom is nice, but Pages has 'Enter Full Screen' which is really nice on the 'View' menu.


#2 Steven Harman avatar
Steven Harman
2.07.2010
11:47 AM

don't forget that Textmate costs dollas... ($).

A while ago I ditched QuickSilver for LaunchBar ($) - tho I feel that it's like Vim, you need to really learn how to use it to get the most out of it. But it does have a nice clipboard ring that I use ALL THE TIME!

MacVim - for all you Vim on Mac needs.

arRsync for setting up & running Rsync jobs - I use this to sync music, pics, videos, docs to an external HDD and just rely on TimeMachine + Carbonite for full machine backups.

GitX is a great Gitk replacement for the Mac, check it out. And while on the topic of Git... check out p4merge for diff/merge. I even have the .gitconfig settings up on my github account if you want them.

iPod Access ($) is great for umm... backing up your iPod. :)

Adium - THE multi-protocol chat client for Mac.


#3 Steven Harman avatar
Steven Harman
2.07.2010
11:47 AM

don't forget that Textmate costs dollas... ($).

A while ago I ditched QuickSilver for LaunchBar ($) - tho I feel that it's like Vim, you need to really learn how to use it to get the most out of it. But it does have a nice clipboard ring that I use ALL THE TIME!

MacVim - for all you Vim on Mac needs.

arRsync for setting up & running Rsync jobs - I use this to sync music, pics, videos, docs to an external HDD and just rely on TimeMachine + Carbonite for full machine backups.

GitX is a great Gitk replacement for the Mac, check it out. And while on the topic of Git... check out p4merge for diff/merge. I even have the .gitconfig settings up on my github account if you want them.

iPod Access ($) is great for umm... backing up your iPod. :)

Adium - THE multi-protocol chat client for Mac.


#4 Steven Harman avatar
Steven Harman
2.07.2010
11:51 AM

Oh yeah... and if you're doing any amount of Ruby development at all, you've got to look into RVM - it is the jam! http://rvm.beginrescueend.com/


#5 Chris Patterson avatar
Chris Patterson
2.07.2010
1:40 PM

Good post Ben.

Pixelmater is great, fast to load, easy to use, and inexpensive. I own it.

Balsamiq is great in desktop mode

I use Tweetdeck as well for mactweeting (almost never, I use Tweetie 2 on the iFone)

MonoDevelop/Mono for C# on Mac (great for sparring with samples, APIs without loading the VM) - and the csharp REPL is very slick and helpful.

Skype (for some reason super slow to load but once it is up it works)

AppFresh will keep all this crap up to date for free.

HandBrake for taking a break :)

I too prefer ScreenFlow to Camtasia (/nod)

Good stuff mayne!


#6 Aviel Lazar avatar
Aviel Lazar
2.07.2010
1:46 PM

This my 2 cents:

Cinch($) - Win7 like windows docking

Bumptop - If you're using your desktop for more than the Hardrive icon.

Fluid - I use it for my gmail and google reader accounts.

BetterTouch - the ultimate touchpad gestures util.

MindNode - mind mapping freeware.

Sequel Pro - MySQL client .


#7 Paul Squyres avatar
Paul Squyres
2.07.2010
3:16 PM

Ohhhhh....almost forgot.....

RadTech makes a really cool sleeve for the MacBook. Check it out. www.radtech.us/.../SleevzNotebooks

You might wanna put an Invisible Shield on your new MacBook so it doesn't get scratched. I bought mine at a kiosk at Memorial City Mall. Definitely worth the price/protection, especially for resale value. And, spend the extra money to get them to put it on for you -- I simply don't have the patience for that.

Twelve South makes this thing called a BookArc. A vertical stand for your MacBook. If you are like me, I'm big on design and all of their products are really cool and innovative. The BackPack for your iMac will come in hand too. twelvesouth.com/.../bookarc


#8 Bob Archer avatar
Bob Archer
2.07.2010
4:40 PM

What about MacPorts? How else will you load all those dev tools and keep them up to date?

Do you not use passenger for your rails dev work?

Textexpander is great too. I forget I have it, but I know it is there helping me all this time.

BOb


#9 John Teague avatar
John Teague
2.07.2010
8:13 PM

This is close to my list too. I second fluid. I use pandora as a menuextra. Just keeps it on my menu and I expand it when I want to.

Also, when doing rails apps, I like this approach to put the app server on a vm and edit directly. It lets you set up rails/gems on a per project basis and makes sure you get a good install. loriholden.com/.../14-seamless-int


#10 Ben Scheirman avatar
Ben Scheirman
2.07.2010
9:17 PM

Thanks for all the suggestions!

@John, I think RVM is a better solution than using a separate virtual machine for each project.

I might be using Passenger in the future, but for now we're looking at Heroku.


#11 Alper avatar
Alper
2.08.2010
7:02 PM

Is the Apple tax worth paying for .NET developers who may be looking to learn Ruby? Picking Apple means having to pay for VM software as well right?


#12 benscheirman avatar
benscheirman
2.08.2010
7:23 PM

@Alper - VMWare Fusion is $79. That shouldn't stop you if you're willing to pay for a Mac.

Personally I'm overjoyed to be on Mac, but certainly it's not for everyone.


#13 Scott Watermasysk avatar
Scott Watermasysk
2.09.2010
11:37 AM

Other things I use all the time for similar setup/goals:

Adium - chat

Notational Velocity (now syncs with SimpleNotes which is now also free). Way better for pure notes than Evernote

Remote Desktop for Mac

Skitch - best screen capture tool around

1Password - not free but by far best tool for managing passwords

Transit - best FTP client I have ever used. Cyberduck is a good free alternaive

AppZapper - great way to delete apps

Tweetie - I avoid AIR apps at all costs

WriteRoom or the new OmniWriter - when you just need to write something


#14 Ryan Rivest avatar
Ryan Rivest
2.22.2010
6:14 PM

Nice post Ben. It's always interesting to see what tools / apps other devs are using. I've been itching to buy a MacBook Pro lately to get started with iPhone development, but I'm waiting for the next revision (which is overdue).


#15 Corey McLellan avatar
Corey McLellan
3.05.2010
8:14 AM

Thanks for this post, Ben. Belated congrats on your job move, too.

I'm setting up my iMac this weekend for similar work and I have licenses for both Fusion and Parallels. Can you share your thoughts on the relative merits of each and whether you'd still recommend Fusion?


#16 benscheirman avatar
benscheirman
3.05.2010
8:26 AM

Corey, the only thing I can attest to is that most of my friends & colleagues also use VMWare Fusion. It seems like they are always catching up with each other. The VMW Fusion 3 supports Aero, but I think Parallels does too now, so I'd say just pick one and run with it :).


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