🌱 My App Defaults

Extremely late to the party, I finally got around to write about my app defaults. A bunch of these are paid apps I probably wouldn’t prioritise if I didn’t already subscribe to Setapp 🖇️ – so keep that in mind. I’ll also give alternatives places where I remember some.

Click here to see the hardware I use this software on!

Lastly, I know that these posts are “supposed” to be simple lists – but I thought I’d add a bit more info.

Systems and productivity

📓 Notes, tasks, and writing

I want to get this one out-of-the-way first, as it’s the most complicated one. (The other entries are much shorter!)

All my notes, tasks, and writing is in a bunch of Markdown files held within NotePlan. But these are also local files I can access with other apps, write to with automation, etc.¹

I prefer to do as much as possible with Paper, which is a super slick Markdown editor. So I use this for writing of blog posts, note-taking, sticky notes, as the default app for random .md files, etc.

I use Ulysses to edit and publish blog posts to Micro.blog.

And occasionally, I’ll use TaskPaper to manage more complicated projects – but as mentioned, all of these apps points at the same NotePlan files!

This is from NotePlan, and I’ve added one extra feature to every task down the list – and as everything is plain-text, I can add it from wherever.

• Farta means “out-and-about” in Norwegian, and is a tag list I use for things I can do if I’m driving around.
• If I add a time, and the task is in a daily note, I’ll get a reminder notification at that time.
• I can add a date at the end, to move it to a daily note (to give me the notification if I’m not in a daily note, or to schedule it for another day).
• You can also create time blocks, by adding an end-time.

I also really, really like Bike Outliner – but I struggle getting it to fit into my workflow. I also dabble in Tot, when I need stickies that stay on-top.

📖 Journaling

I absolutely fall into this cliché: I wish I journal more than I do. But when I do, I do it in Everlog. I like that it’s Markdown and linkable.

📅 Calendar

I use BusyCal. It’s way cheaper than Fantastical (and included in Setapp), while being almost as good. (There are some things I prefer in BusyCal, as well, actually.) I think this is a nice sweet point if you want something a bit more powerful than Calendar.app, but don’t want to pay Fantastical money.

🌦️ Weather app

Here’s a great tip (that probably mostly Norwegians know about): Here in Norway, we have a publicly funded weather service, called Yr (which means drizzle). It’s good, completely free (and without ads), and has good apps for both Android and iOS. And guess what: It’s available in English as well!

Pronunciation guide: The y is a monophthong, that sounds like the ui sound in “build”.

🛒 Shopping list

My wife and I use Bring, which is a great little uni-tasker!

📮 Mail server

I host through Fastmail 🖇️. I go into why here.

📨 Mail client

I sincerely hope Mimestream gets to building JMAP support because I don’t like any of the mail client options out there… I think I prefer Spark – however my wife is on my Power User Setapp account, so only one of us can use Spark through that. So I let her have it, and just use Mail.app. It’s aggressively “fine” – but I at least like it better than the Fastmail client.

💬 Chat app

The one I use the most, and prefer, is Telegram. I don’t use their more “social media like” features at all, so it’s annoying that these have a tendency of getting them in trouble (for good reasons!). Because as a simple chat app, it’s terrific. It’s very much like if iMessage was better and cross-platform!²

However, I also pay close attention to Signal and Matrix, as I have to evaluate when Telegram does enough things I disagree with that I “have to” switch. (I would rather not switch to one of the more “monopolistic” options.)

🌐 Browser

As I mentioned in this post, I don’t think it’s necessary to use the same browser on desktop and mobile. Sadly, Apple is blocking third-party browsers from having extensions on iOS/iPadOS, so I use Safari on iPad. On iPhone, I switch between Safari and Quiche Browser, which has enough nice things built in to be a good experience.

On the desktop, I think Arc is my favourite browser. But I try to avoid using Chromium/Blink, and I don’t love their direction – so I don’t use it. I’ve used Firefox – and I don’t mind it if I spend some time adjusting it. I’m very interested in how the vertical tab update turns out! However, the two I’ve used the most lately are Zen and SigmaOS.

The latter is a slick WebKit browser with many similar ideas to Arc, and a couple of their own.

The former is a really promising Firefox fork, which is pretty pleasant out-of-the-box, with a good design and built in vertical tabs. But a really cool idea, is a “modification market” of sorts, where you can install little adjustments made by others. In addition to Firefox’s general customisability, you can really make it your own!

🔎 Search Engine

I use, and love, Kagi Search. I wrote more about it here! They also make a WebKit browser, called Orion – but it’s not for me. However, Kagi is still available in every other browser, through an extension.³

🔖 Bookmarks

To quote myself, from this post:

For bookmarks, I use Anybox, and I really like it! I love that it’s not a read-later app. It’s specifically built for getting anything in and out of a box – and not for consuming it in-app. Goodlinks and Raindrop are other alternatives.

🔐 Password management

Another quote from the same post:

I use 1Password for passwords (and much more). I like it – but here is the fact that it’s cross-platform significant. The reason is that I have my family members on the plan, and I would rather not force them onto specific devices. For a free alternative, I’d go for something like Bitwarden over the built-in OS or browser features.

I also use it to store things like secure notes, SSL, a scan of my passport, company number, etc.

📶 RSS backend

To make it easy to move between clients (and for some newsletter features), my RSS feeds are in Feedbin.

📰 RSS reader

These are the reasons I use Lire: It’s cheap, feels and looks pretty good, can cache truncated feeds, and display sites (on a site-by-site basis) in inline browser. The latter is so that I can browse blogs on their native websites, while getting new articles in my feed.

📁 Cloud File Storage

I use, and quite enjoy, Dropbox. I like that it’s a larger player while not being one of the absolute giants. It’s a bit more neutral than something from Apple, Google, or Microsoft.

🌅 Photo storage and management

I do store my photos in Photos.app, though – and use iCloud for the backups. I intend to get a Mac Mini, though – to set up some extra backup. I’ve tried Photomator a bit, and I really like it! If I worked a bit more with photos (which I might in the future), I think I’d pay for that.

📷 Camera app

I just use Camera.app. But in a year or two I intend to upgrade my iPhone 13 Mini, and then perhaps to a Pro phone (for the better cameras). At that time, or maybe before, I think I’ll look into things like Halide or Obscura!

⏲️ Time tracking

I hear everyone mentioning Timery – but I use TimeMator. It’s included in Setapp as well, so “free”, and I like that it doesn’t need another backend. (Timery uses Toggl.) It has slick apps for Mac, iPad and iPhone, and also supports automatic tracking (which I don’t use).

Tools and utilities

🤖 Automation and settings

Much of the lube in my workflows comes from the trifecta of BetterTouchTool, Karabiner-Elements and Keyboard Maestro.

🔩 Text Editor

For coding, I use Nova. It’s a Mac-assed Mac app, and it offers some features that make life easier for a noob like me.⁴ I’ve also used, and recommend, Zed: It’s even faster than Nova (which is also fast), but a bit more bare-bones and harder to get into. And it’s free, and also available for Linux (and soon Windows)!

📟 Terminal

Speaking of noob friendly tools, I really like the terminal app Warp 🖇️. It looks slick, has a bunch of things that make it behave more like other apps (for instance, in how you select text), and gives a little help here and there. I’ve also used, and like, iTerm.

🧮 Calculator

For good reason, PCalc gets a lot of love. But I don’t think any of its modes reaches my favourite,SC-323PU. I just love the great overview you get! And I’m a maths teacher, so you can trust me.

🖼️ Screenshots

On Mac, I use the excellent CleanShot X. On iOS/iPadOS, I use a combination of Annotable and Shareshot. The former is a better version of the built-in Annotate tools. The latter is a way to frame screenshots with devices, like the one of the calculator. It’s a bit expensive for what it is, so I would recommend getting the Apple Frames shortcut. But every so often, when I have a little extra money, I like to splurge a bit on apps that I don’t need, but that are nice!

🚀 Launcher

I really, really like Raycast 🖇️. Not only is it a great launcher, but (among other things) I also use it for this:

• Setting keyboard shortcuts for opening apps and running shortcuts
• Window management
• AI chat and commands
• Text snippets

It also has tons of extensions you can install. For instance, I have one to create masked emails from Fastmail, and another to search for links in Anybox.

📋 Clipboard manager

Raycast also has a decent clipboard manager – but Paste is better, and included in Setapp.

📄 PDF tool

I use NitroPDF. It’s an app that I would never pay for – but it’s included in Setapp, so I’m happy that I get a slightly better tool than the default one. There are several apps like this on the list, including the next one:

🗜️ Zip tool

Archiver stays out of the way, and does just what you want it to do nicely. However, the free The Unarchiver is also great!

🍸 Menu bar organiser

I also use Bartender through Setapp, and I like it. It did get purchased recently, so if you want an alternative, I’d check out Ice. There are some advanced features I use in Bartender, though, which I fear aren’t in Ice. I like that it can automatically show the battery when it gets low, and that I can automatically change layout when I connect to my Studio Display.

🗑️ Uninstaller

Pearcleaner is a simple app that does what it does so well.

🌍 VPN

I very rarely use a VPN – but when I do, I like that Setapp comes with a nice one, called ClearVPN.

🖌️ Design tools

I use, and greatly recommend, the Affinity Suite of apps. I use all three, but I’m, by far, most comfortable with Designer.

Entertainment

🎬 Video player

I don’t view a lot of video on my Mac, but when I do, I use Elmedia Player. Where it not for Setapp (again), I’d use Iina.

🎤 Podcast player

I’m a long-time Overcast user. The developer recently released a complete overwrite of the app. This was clearly needed, and absolutely the right move for the app’s future, which I’m excited about. But currently I like it less than I did pre-rewrite.

🐘 Mastodon client

Mastodon is my social media of choice, and there are so many great apps for it out there! But my favourite, is Mona.

🎵 Music

A couple of months ago, I switched from Spotify to Tidal. The better sound quality I viewed as a bonus, while the main reason was due to the higher artist payments. However, I’m not sure I, and most other people, evaluate the payments correctly – so not sure if I got that right. (More on this here!) I also think Spotify is a better app and service, so I do miss it. But I don’t have a plan to move back at the moment.

That’s it! These apps have stayed the same for a while – but I still love checking out new stuff, so there will probably be changes down the line.