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Uses

The software that I use on a daily basis

I list below the software that I use on my devices. This list is dynamic: it evolves as my needs and tastes change over time, as old applications become unsupported and new ones become available. What you see below is what I find optimal currently, and I have arrived upon this after a great deal of discovery and experimentation. I try to use free and open-source software wherever possible.

Let me know if you find any of these helpful and if you have started using them yourself. I also welcome suggestions for alternatives to the applications listed below that you think do the job better.

Laptop

Operating system

I use a distribution of Linux called Fedora Workstation on my laptop. I mostly use it with niri, a beautiful scrollable tiling Wayland compositor. Niri is very light on resource consumption, extremely customizable, and a joy to use using just the keyboard. As the name suggests, if you open a new window, niri neatly places it next to the existing ones like tiles instead of opening over them. This way, windows never overlap (unless you want them to) and window management is easy and efficient.  The default install of niri is pretty barebones. You have to install additional software and play around with the config to get it to work the way you want it to work, so niri is recommended only if you have at least a moderate proficiency in Linux and you love tinkering with things.

Before niri, I used to use (and still sometimes use)1 the GNOME desktop environment. It is simple, elegant, stable, and a joy to use. It is easy to get started with and works great out of the box. This is the desktop environment (DE) that comes by default with distros such as Fedora and Ubuntu, and if you are new to Linux, this is the DE that I recommend that you start with.

Previously, I ran Arch Linux (btw) with hyprland, another tiling Wayland compositor. Even more previously, I have used the tiling window managers XMonad, herbsluftwm, and awesomewm. However, I had to switch away from them as they do not support Wayland.

Text Editor

I used to use Neovim to edit my text files. Neovim was easily my favourite text editor. I could not imagine using any other text editor, ever.

But ever since I switched my keyboard layout, vim motions became inconvenient and emacs became a lot more ergonomic. So I switched to emacs. It is now my favourite text editor, by far, and I cannot imagine using any other text editor, ever.

Keyboard remapping

I use Kanata to remap all the keys on my laptop. More details on how and why coming soon…

Browser

I use Firefox with the following extensions:

  • uBlock Origin to block all pesky ads, warn me about dangerous redirects, and to block any element from any website that I do not want to see.
  • LeechBlock NG to add time limits and blocks to websites that are addictive timesinks.
  • Bitwarden Password Manager to generate and store all my passwords.
  • Enhancer for YouTube for cool customizations on YouTube such as adding a mini popup player, hiding shorts and recommended videos, and so much more.
  • SponsorBlock to skip over sponsored segments in videos on YouTube.

Reading

  • I use Zathura when I am using niri and GNOME Papers when I using GNOME to read PDF files. I love that Zathura supports SyncTeX so when I am writing a document in LaTeX, I can click on the PDF to find the corresponding line of LaTeX code in emacs.
  • I rarely read ebooks on my laptop since I have an e-Ink ebook reader, but when I do read ebooks on my laptop, I use Foliate. It is a beautiful and well-designed ePUB reader.
  • I manage my ebook libary using Calibre.
  • I use Zotero to manage the research papers that I want to read.

Note-taking

  • Almost all of my typed note-taking occurs in emacs, in Org Mode. I find that it is hands down the best way to capture, write, organize, and export your notes.

  • When I want to take handwritten notes or want to annotate PDFs, I use Xournal++ and use my drawing tablet to draw/write.

Miscellaneous

Terminal emulator

  • When I am in emacs (which is most of the time) I use the inbuilt shell:
    M-x shell or M-x project-shell.
  • When I am not in emacs, I use Kitty: it is fast, performant, and customizable, and featureful.

Graphics

Music

  • I sometimes listen to online radio stations using Shortwave.

Email

  • Thunderbird
  • mu4e

Network File sharing

  • Packet

GNOME extensions

While I no longer use GNOME, these were the extensions that I found useful (or made the GNOME shell look more beautiful).

  • AppIndicator and KStatusNotifierItem Support
  • Battery time
  • Blur my Shell
  • Gnome 4x UI improvements
  • Net speed Simplified
  • Night Theme Switcher

Phone

I use an Android phone and an Android tablet. I install apps through F-Droid whenever possible. Some notable apps that I use:

Authentication

  • Aegis Authenticator
  • Bitwarden

Media

  • AntennaPod
  • URL Radio
  • Auxio
  • Aves Libre
  • mpv-android

Productivity

  • Goodtime Productivity
  • AnkiDroid
  • PTO
  • Habits
  • Simple Time Tracker

Tools

  • Compass
  • Cirrus
  • Barcode Scanner
  • Luftlinie
  • QDict
  • Chooser
  • Tuner
  • Organic Maps
  • Survival Manual
  • Trail Sense
  • Stellarium
  • FitoTrack
  • Dropsync
  • Audio Spectrum Analyzer
  • Notification dictionary

Reading

  • Capy Reader
  • Firefox
  • Librera Reader
  • MJ PDF
  • KOReader
  • Read You
  • Markor

Keyboard

  • Unexpected Keyboard

Privacy

  • Tracker Control
  • URLCheck

Launcher

  • Dragon Launcher
  • Pie Launcher
  • Niagara Launcher

Terminal emulator

  • Termux
  • Termux: X11

Communication

  • Thunderbird
  • Signal

Fun

  • Shader Editor
  • PlantNet

Last updated on .

  1. There are some features that I do not know how to get working in niri such as remote input with KDE Connect and file sharing over network. When I need these features, I briefly use GNOME. ↩︎