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David Yu's Blog.

My software tools

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David Yu
David Yu

Here are a list of my favourite tools I will always download on my new computer. This is aimed at frontend development.

Summary of Tools

  • Get a Macbook
  • Homebrew
  • Zsh
  • VSCode
  • Gitkraken
  • Team communication software
  • Node (Through homebrew)
  • Yarn
  • Table Plus and Sequel Pro (optional)
  • Postman

A Closer Look

  • Get a Macbook
    • Things will run faster e.g. tests, starting node servers
    • Most OSS libraries don't support windows well
  • Homebrew
    • Easier to install and update tools e.g. node
  • Zsh
    • Improves your terminal experience e.g. the look of it to and better autocompletion
  • VSCode
    • Surprisingly built on electron its the most popular IDE out there and comes fully featured. Only reason I use it is because I am most familiar with it.
  • Gitkraken
    • This ones optional and has its drawbacks, a lot of its features are already there. I think now days vscode does a pretty good job at visualizing your git changes and you can quickly commit in terminal with git shortcuts. But worth taking a look at.
  • Team communication software
    • This can be anything e.g. slack, teams, discord, gitter, spectrum. My favourite is teams just don't use facebook messenger..
    • This makes it easier to collaborate since it is much easier to share code snippets. Pin important things and add reminders for the entire team
  • Node (Through homebrew)
    • You will need this
  • Yarn
    • This is like npm I mean the npm CLI app not the npm registry. Personally just has a better experience with yarn over npm. Never had any issues installing packages, never had to use sudo and commands are shorter.
  • Table Plus and Sequel Pro (optional)
    • You will probably interact with an SQL database. This helps with viewing the data in your database. Table Plus covers Sequel Pro, Sequel Pro is just my MySQL databases but it is a simple yet powerful tool so you may find that you prefer Sequel Pro when interacting with MySQL databases
    • These tools might not be needed since relational databases aren't cool anymore ;)
  • Postman
    • Helpful in testing your API server. Basically like cURL but in GUI form. You send a HTTP call and the results are displayed back to you.
    • Might not be needed since REST is dead ;) GraphQL is the better REST :) (This is just a joke but read my GraphQL Hype post if I ever get to finish it)

Now you are ready to build the next Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Uber, Airbnb, Canva, Snapchat, Dropbox, Amazon (Not joking about this)