My Tech Stack - The tools and services that I use (pt. 1)
I’m considered a bit of an odd duck among my family and friends, not least because of my software choices. I take some pride in the knowledge that most of the tools I use aren’t exactly mainstream. Sometimes, it’s fun being the odd one out, but it can also be frustrating, as it becomes harder to follow online tutorials or documentation.
Nonetheless, in this series of blog posts, I would like to outline some of these tools, and hopefully shed some light on the more obscure ones.
I also hope to provide some insight into why I use that particular tool/service, and why I think you should use it as well. The goal is primarily to cover the most important tools: operating systems, web browsers and the like, although I may expand it to include any other software utilities that I find particularly interesting.
Let’s start with the Operating System.
“Wait a second”, you may be thinking. “That’s actually pretty mainstream”. Of course, within the Linux community, Arch (and especially its fantastic wiki) are ubiquitous. But let’s not kid ourselves - Linux is still far from a mainstream OS.
I love this little penguin like you wouldn’t believe.
Anyway, if you’re not familiar with Arch Linux, or just Linux in general, it is an obscure, hard-to-install, feature-lacking, command-line-centric operating system.
If you clicked on the links, you would know that it is, in fact, none of the above. Linux is refreshingly easy to use. You don’t need to know the command-line to use Linux (although it definitely helps), and installing Linux has become as easy as installing Windows. To be fair, this mostly depends on which Linux distribution you use. I use Arch Linux, which is infamously hard to install. I use it primarily because it offers a nice, minimalist desktop experience for me. However, the open-source nature of Linux means that there are quite literally hundreds of distributions out there for your consideration. My personal recommendations are Linux Mint or Pop!_OS. Why do I use Linux? Without going into too much detail (this could actually be a blog post of it’s own), here are some brief reasons:
Programming - The availability of package managers makes programming and dependency installation a breeze, especially with the power of command-line text editors. No IDE’s for me!
Lack of bloat - Certain Linux distributions, like Arch, prioritize the KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) philosophy, which emphasizes a lack of pre-installed bloat, and gives the user a very minimal base, upon which to ‘build’ their Operating System. The downside is that you may need to install a lot of packages and applications that you would expect to be shipped other Operating Systems. The advantage is that you only install what you want to.
Open Source - This one is a little less concrete than the others, but the fact that Linux is open-source means that there is a certain level of trust; the Operating System is less likely to phone home, for example. Of course, most people cannot fully understand the source code that compromises a behemoth like the Linux kernel, but the open-source nature guarantees a certain level of transparency and privacy.
Combine this with the fact that I can run any Operating System I want through the magic of virtualization (a topic for another blog post), and using Linux is a no-brainer. Arch Linux in particular, with its Pacman package manager, makes package installation and management trivial.
A smaller installed size on my hard disk, reduced RAM usage, faster boot times, a more convenient programming environment, the list could go on and on. What’s more, it all comes at the grand price of $0! That’s an inherent benefit of Free and Open Source Software. Sure, there are ways of monetizing Open Source software, but the expectation with most FOSS (Free and Open Source Software), is that it is also free (as in gratis), since it’s hard to sell something when the source code is publicly available.
As a nice bonus, you can also make it look any darn way you want .
