Useful macOS tools

Somehow my colleagues think I'm a seasoned macOS user with a lot of nice gimicky applications, so they've asked me to compile a list of applications useful for my workflow. In the past (omg, almost 10 years ago!), I've already written about Hammerspoon, which I continue using. Consider this list an update and extension to this post 😊

General Productivity 🚀

• Raycast – super useful launcher (think Spotlight on steroids), with customizable shortcuts and hotkeys. Basic version is free, for some AI features plus configuration sync you'll have to shell out a few bucks. So far, I'm quite happy with the free version and use it all the time. Don't like Raycast? Alfred is a great alternative option.
• Hammerspoon – Makes a lot of OS and accessibility features scriptable via a nice Lua API. Can be used to automate essentially everything, for example by using ...
• PaperWM.spoon – a tiling window manager for macOS, inspired by the great PaperWM. Ever thought about having your windows next to each other, sharing screen space automatically? Then this is the go-to solution. You can even have it switch between applications by swiping your trackpad.

• OmniFocus – my go-to task manager. Been using it since about for ever, and still love it. There's also iPad and iOS apps avaiable. No free version, but the great people at OmniGroup deserve your money for building amazing software.
• Orion – my (currently) favourite web browser, with a focus on privacy and speed. By the awesome people who brought you the search engine Kagi.

Keyboard and Mouse Things

• Karabiner Elements – an extremely useful tool for customising just about anything about your keyboard. Especially useful if you're a connoisseur of weird mechanical keyboards with custom firmware.
• Steermouse – What Karabiner is to your keyboard, Steermouse is to your mouse. Can customise a lot of aspects of your mouse, and for example turn your trackball into an omnidirectional scrollwheel. Supercool.

Backup

Kein Backup, kein Mitleid – no backup, no sympathy. As the saying goes.

• Arq Backup – I got bitten by broken Time Machine backups a few times. Arq is a commercial software that does it's job very well and can backup to any destination ranging from folders, over SFTP destinations, to S3 or Backblaze. The archive format is fully documented, which is extremely helpful should Arq at some point vanish.

Terminal Stuff

I'm quite a heavy terminal user, so I do have an semi-strong opinion on how to spice up your terminal experience:

• iTerm2 – a much better terminal emulator than the included Terminal.app, offering different profiles, a Quake-like slide-in console, split windows, ...
• oh my zsh – not strictly macOS-related, but also useful on Linux or any Unix flavour of your choice. Offers great extensions for git, virtualenvs, etc. with very sane defaults. Much easier to use now since zsh is the default shell on macOS.

Feel like anything's missing? Let me know!