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 recently wrote about not needing USB-A, and mentioned the USB-C Lifestyle™️. That reminded me of a little bundle of cables I always keep in my backpack. So here are some …

Advice for frustration-free charging

1) Buy extra

Here’s my bundle:

The trick is that I don’t need any of these elsewhere – they are extra. I have other chargers in my office, next to my bed, etc. I get that this is a bit more wasteful than just having one charger that you move around everywhere. But I think this is resource spending that’s worth it – and hopefully the devices you buy don’t come with (sub-par) chargers you don’t need. Furthermore, try to keep chargers for a long time.

2) Think about colour and texture of the cables

These are the cables in the bundle:

• USB-C, 3 meters (black, braided)
• MagSafe for Mac (light gray, braided)
• Lightning, 1 meter (white)
• Micro-USB (black)

As you can see, all of them have a different combination of colour and texture. This makes it easier to pick out the correct one!

3) Don’t buy “original” chargers

In general, buying “original” accessories will give you something that might be pricier, but at least is among the best. But when it comes to chargers, and especially compared to Apple, the third-party chargers are objectively better. The reason being that Apple doesn’t use GaN, a relatively new technology that allows for significantly smaller size to power ratio.

Mine’s a 65 watt Anker charger 🖇️, that I really like. Because while I don’t necessarily recommend getting chargers from Apple/Samsung/etc., I do recommend getting a “name-brand” one. Anker is a brand I’ve always been pleased with, so I haven’t tried many others. But I think Ugreen and Belkin might be decent as well. Would love to hear about it if you have other recommendations I can add here!

4) Get enough wattage, but not more