Carlos Matallín

Switched

A fortnight ago I finally committed the bought of the aluminium MacBook I so much longed. For the geekiest ones’ interest it’s the basic model, because I actually didn’t need much more performance and I do appreciate the lightness of a smaller laptop.

I had already fallen in love with this redesigned Apple laptop before it was released in the latest 2008, so when it came the Christmas time and my birthday I gathered all the income I could in order to renew my (not very old) PC.

I know I was (and I still am) an Open Source enthusiast -enthusiast is the word for that kind of person who has been able to compile a Gentoo system from Stage 1- however as I am taking more and more work in the last months I needed a professional portable computer I hadn’t to struggle with in order to have it working. And the final result is…

I couldn’t be more satisfied with the purchase of the MacBook in terms of hardware and, software over all. It exactly meet my needs as I got it in order to move from one place to another now that I’m living in Valencia; the apartment, the University, my parent’s house… furthermore Mac OS X was meant to make our lives easier; the rock stability of UNIX but as sexy as any OS I had seen before, with a very special care of small details. So it has definitely made my blogging and web development job a pleasure (that’s what it must be). Anyway, I still will promote and defend Free and Open Source Software.

This is how my workspace looks now:

As you can see, the aspect of my desktop hasn’t changed much from the default settings; I’m not such a great fan of desk-modding and I feel perfectly comfortable as it is. For those interested in my daily usage I will list the programs I use grouped by space/area of work:

1. IM / Communications
- iChat
- Skype
- Adium (only for logging in eventually with my Y! account)

2. GTD / Management
- Things
- Gmail (it has it’s own application with fluid)
- NetNewsWire

3. Navigation
- Safari (4 beta)
- Firefox (for webdesign and where Safari 4 flaws)

4. Coding
- Coda (frontend work)
- TextMate (backend work)
- Cyberduck

5. Design
- Adobe Creative Suite
- Pixelmator
- Skitch

6. Media
- iTunes
- Spotify
- VLC (the ONE player)

Utilities / No space assigned
- iWork ‘09
- iLife ‘09
- Awaken
- Transmission
- Dropbox
- Evernote
- Twitterrific
- CoconutBattery
- Paparazzi!
- PokerStars
- Zattoo (3 months HiQ subscription)
- Google Earth

¿Do you recommend me anything more?