Hi, I'm Grace Smith » Dock Series

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 34

Grace — Fri, 26 Nov 2010 17:05:39 +0000

Michael Beckwith is an Interactive Developer from South Dakota, USA. He has a passion for the ideas behind open source and collaborative work. Open standards and pushing the way people interact with it has long been an interest to him.

When it comes to web development he is enamored with the upcoming HTML5/CSS3 changes coming in the near future. He is always looking for ways to incorporate those technologies now, whether through an isolated test instance or through a new wordpress website, his favorite CMS, that he is theming from scratch. He is a constant thinker who is always striving to put new ideas into his box of tricks.

The Intro…

This is actually the first Mac that I have worked on with any consistency. It came with the job, and all my previous mac experience came in college/university in the form of a single computer lab. Needless to say, coming from years of Linux and occasional Windows use, it has been a bit of a change for me. I still get keys mixed up when I switch between setups.

The Dock…

Terminal – Usually used to kill programs which have stalled, however it also proves useful for an occasional git pull.
Tweetdeck – My preferred twitter client on the mac when not using my Motorola Droid.
XChat – Good ole IRC where I hang out in the official chat rooms for WordPress, CSS, and HTML5.
Newsfire – RSS feed reader that I use to read work-relevant blogs and website feeds.
Textmate – What can I say about Textmate that hasn’t been said before. One of the best.
CSSEdit – I like to keep my website markup and template files so separated from CSS that I use a totally different program!
Cyberduck – This is a case of I wanted easy to use FTP access, but one that also allowed me to edit files right from the server in my external editors. I didn’t want to have to go through the process of hitting upload and download all the itme. Cyberduck automates that half and I just need to hit save.
Color Picker – I forget exactly what I did, but this is a built in mac color picker that I wanted easier access to, when I need to change between RGB and html hex.
Evernote – My ultimate note taker whether I have a piece of paper or not. I also have the Clip To Evernote chrome extension both at work and at home for easy bookmarking for if I need to save something for either location.
Skype – While it is not limited to work contacts, when at work, I use skype for a lot of communication with people within the project I’m working on.
Dropbox – Another app that needs no real introduction. It is also used for sharing things with myself between home and work, as well as a central place for some code/wordpress plugins that are being done outside of work need.
Mail – To check my company email of course.
Songbird – I am not a fan of iTunes at all other than for its podcast management and use Songbird for any music listening when not using a small 8gb music clip.
Photoshop – Since I’m a lot more on the developer side still, I use photoshop primarily to slice mockups provided to me and turn them into the working template files for use on project sites. I’d like to get into a position of doing some designing as well.
Chrome/Firefox4/Opera/Safari – Two are shown, but I have all four in a custom Mac OS Stack for easy access and less dock clutter. For any IE testing, I use an old personal laptop with XP still on it and a program called IETester.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Michael for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 34 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 33

Grace — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 13:54:44 +0000

Martin Lucas is a freelance website designer based in Colchester, specialising in building websites for small local businesses and individuals – usually building their first website and launching them on to the great big world wide web. He is passionate about the social web and WordPress.

The Intro…

Currently on my second Mac, a 13in MBP which I brought 3 months ago; this was after owning a 12in G4 Powerbook – which was becoming a struggle to work on.

The Dock…

Dashboard – I do actually have a couple of apps I use in here, apart from the Calculater and Conversion tool – I use a Loren Ipsom generator by Tobias Ahlin which is rather nice.
Photoshop – I’ve been using PhotoShop for over 10 years now, I do all my designing in it – when possibly Illustrator and Fireworks could be better suited – but I’m so comfortable with PS it takes half the time.
Dreamweaver – Using this less and less now-a-days as I’m working with WordPress more and more, I even looked into switching to Coda – but I couldn’t as there are too many features I’d miss; especially the server behaviours which I rely on for my PHP / MySQL work.
Adobe Illustrator – As I said, I don’t use this as much as I should – so last year I started designing T-Shirts to sell online and forced myself to do all the designing in Illustrator and it’s definitely helped me learn the application and work out how I can use it more in the future.
CyberDuck – My FTP client of choice.
MAMP – I’ll either develope a site on the live hosting / domain or I’ll work offline on my laptop with this Apache / MySQL and PHP setup.
Text Editor – Editing and viewing simple documents, I also use Google Docs.
Stickies – I used to organise all my work and life on these things, now I use them for simple lists of current projects so I can quickly see what I have on and what I can coming up in the future.
CurdBee – This is my invoicing app of choice, I’ve used the Fluid App to create an application from this superb web based invoicing application.
Dictionary – My spelling can by quite bad at times, so this gets me out of trouble on a regular basis.
Contacts – Keeps all my addresses.
iCal – I try to organise as much of my work / personal life in iCal as I can.
Tweetie – Just switched from TweetDeck to this and enjoying the cleaner interface and the less is more approach when compared to all those columns I had going on previously.
Skype – Only just signed up, hoping it will come in hand with future clients that like to use it.
GMail – Another Fluid App, this time my Google Mail account as a separate application.
FireFox – Browser of choice, and had been since my recent MBP upgrade.
Safari – Now only used for testing.
Opera – Surprised me how quick this browser is – but still only use it for testing.
Chrome – Another speedy alternative browser, and again only really used for testing.
Camino – The least used of my browsers, and one for just us Mac users. I occasionally use it when I feed the need for a stripped down simple browser.
Paparazzi – Screen grabs of individual web pages, handy for taking screen shots for portfolio pieces.
iTunes – Music all day long with this.
LastFM – I also use LastFM’s radio stations based on artists and keywords (my username is djmartinlucas if you’d like to find me).
Spotify – I’ve only just started using Spotify but I’m already building a nice collection of albums and playlists and really like saving a few pennies as I actually don’t mind the adverts.
Preview – I use it as my PDF reader, I find it quicker to use than Adobe Acrobat.
iPhoto Buddy – This is cool, it allows me to have 2 separate iPhoto albums (or more if you wanted), I have one for all my stock photos and a second for my personal photography.
iPhoto – See above.
Linotype Font Explorer – I use this to browse and organise my fonts.
App Cleaner – If I didn’t have this then I would end up with a whole load of applications (and all their files) installed on my Mac that I had tried and then forgot about. This makes it really easy to uninstall any unneeded application that you want to get rid of.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Martin for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 33 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 32

Grace — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 10:59:44 +0000

Jack Franklin is an 18 year old web designer and developer who lives in the beautiful area of England, Cornwall. Having started out with HTML and CSS at the age of just 13, Jack has been extending his skill-set ever since and works regularly with HTML, CSS, Javascript and PHP, although his main area of enjoyment lies in jQuery.

I asked Jack if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer and developer on a daily basis.

The Intro….

I picked up my first Mac about a year ago having been an admirer for a number of years. It wasn’t much, an old G5 iMac, 17″ screen but it was mine and I loved it. I did all my website work on there and soon became so fond of some of the apps available. I’ve since moved onto an older Macbook, from 2007, which runs Snow Leopard. I plan to upgrade in the next few months to one of the new iMacs and maybe an iPad.

The Dock…

Finder – It’s just Finder. For some reason some people hate it but I don’t know why, it does its job very well.
Things – If you’re a Mac user and have not heard of Things, you should. It’s a superb to-do app. If I’m honest I prefer The Hit List, but the lack of iPhone app means Things wins. It’s a pleasure to use, and notice how I have no due tasks. I am efficient.
Safari – It runs very quickly on my Macbook, and V5 is the best yet. My default browser for all day to day browsing.
Mail – Mail is the best mail client I’ve ever used. It’s brilliant. I use lots of rules to organise mail into lots of folders, meaning I know exactly where everything is. It’s search facility is a real winner.
Skype – I use this to talk with people from all over the place, whether it be just for a friendly chat or a client. The fact I can go on Skype and call someone else on Skype who might be thousands of miles away and not be charged any money is amazing..
Transmit 4 – The best FTP app ever. Period. The recent update to version 4 has transformed it from a good FTP app to a superb one. The design is awesome and everything works as expected..
Fireworks – I rarely touch Photoshop now, all my mocking-up work is done in Fireworks. It’s made for it, whereas Photoshop is all about image editing at heart.
Textmate – I’m a geeky coder at heart and Textmate offers unrivalled features when it comes to coding. The bundles allow me to set up shortcuts to increase the speed at which I can code and it’s lighting quick.
Spotify – Does it need an introduction? Free music! At the moment I’m not subscribed on a paid plan but I’m considering it, however the free version suits my needs perfectly for the time being.
Ecoute – Ecoute sits in your dock and is a way to play all your iTunes music (including songs that you bought on iTunes, aka DRM protected ones) without loading up iTunes, which is one of Apple’s only bad apps at the moment. It’s quick, easy and works, for just $10 it’s a great steal. I love how the icon updates to show the song artwork. (PS – that’s not Glee playing, definitely not!).
Forrst via Fluid – Forrst is a website that allows you to share work and get honest feedback by others. I use this so much, both for giving advice and help to others and also getting help. Using an app called Fluid it allows me to use the website as if it was a proper application and access it from the dock.
MAMP – MAMP installs Apache and MySQL to your computer so you can run PHP locally. Invaluable for development.
Curdbee via Fluid – Once again I used Fluid to bring Curdbee to my desktop. Curdbee is a very good, simple invoicing app which I use to keep track of my money.
1Password – I use this to keep track of my passwords on websites and all the serials for all my software.
Firefox – Firefox + Web Developer Toolbar + Firebug is the best web development browser by a mile.
AppCleaner – You drag an Application icon to AppCleaner and it uninstalls it and all the extra files the app installs. I just use it to keep everything neat and tidy in my Applications folders..
Stack: Browsers – All the browsers I have sit in this stack, as I tend to try different ones all the time..
Stack: Recently used Apps – This lists my 8 most recently used apps which sounds not that useful but it really is.
Folder: Public Folder – This is a quick shortcut to my public folder, working in an office things always get sent from laptop to laptop via everyone’s public folders so often I need to get to this folder.
The Trash – I try and keep this empty but sometimes it fills up.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Jack for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check each week for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 32 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 31

Grace — Wed, 19 May 2010 13:32:30 +0000

Scott Glasser is a freelance web designer and developer out of Schenectady, NY. He manages and owns sum(design), and also handles all of the web development duties for a local web and graphic design shop. He loves PHP, HTML, CSS, Javascript and jQuery, MySQL and MS SQL, User Interface design, SEO, Macs, the Chicago Bears, and things that transform.

I asked Scott if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer and developer on a daily basis.

The Intro…

I carry my trusty 2008/2009 15″ Macbook Pro with me everywhere I go. I have a 24″ monitor, and external keyboard and mouse at home and at the office. They aren’t Cinema displays (yet) but they do the job.

The Dock…

Finder – I find myself favoring Pathfinder, but rely heavily on Finder. The truth is, I strongly dislike Pathfinder’s icon, so I can’t bring myself to keeping it in my dock.
Firefox – I’m sort of addicted to Firefox. There, I admitted it. The extensions make it absolutely essential for me on a day to day basis. I could not live without the Firebug, Web Developer, Read-it-later, Colorzilla, and Measureit extensions.
Safari – Firefox is my go to browser, but I find myself in Safari quite often. It’s not a memory hog, like Firefox, and launches much, much faster.
Google Chrome – I’m not a huge fan of Chrome, but I keep it around for testing, and in hopes that it continues to improve. Now that extensions are supported, it could become useful. We will see.
Postbox – Postbox recently became my default email client. If you haven’t tried it, I strongly recommend it. As much as I loved Mail.app, I’ll never go back!
iCal – Well, it’s a calendar. What more can I say? I actually use Google Calendar as my primary scheduling tool, but sync to Mac and iPhone.
Things – Things is my task manager of choice. I’ve tried Basecamp, Remember the Milk, The Hit List, but always find myself coming back to Things. I love it for it’s simplicity and aesthetics, as well as the companion iPhone app and wi-fi sync. My only complaint is that it doesn’t support nested tasks. *grumble*
Photoshop – Photoshop does most of the heavy graphic design lifting for me, but I’d like to start using Pixelmator more regularly. Mainly because of it’s speed.
Color Schemer Studio – Color Schemer is extremely handy to have around. The $50 price tag might be a bit much, but was lucky enough to grab it when it was on sale at either MacUpdate or MacZot.
Littlesnapper – Littlesnapper is one of those apps that you don’t realize how useful it is until you really start using it. I find myself accessing it constantly to quickly capture design elements on sites and in apps (much easier than digging through bookmarks for inspiration), screen captures of complete web pages, creating quick instruction sheets for clients, highlighting browser bugs/design flaws, etc. I don’t know how I lived without it.
TextMate – I’ve used, and loved, both Coda and Espresso, but just cannot move away from TextMate. For me, it’s pretty close to being the perfect development tool.
Transmit – Combined with the power and flexibility of TextMate, via bundle, Transmit is a near perfect fit for my workflow. It’s fast, compatible, easy to use, and powerful.
Sequel Pro – As a web developer, and a PHP guy, I find myself dealing with MySQL databases constantly. It’s donation ware, so if you’re looking for a great MySQL development tool you really have to give Sequel Pro a shot.
Adium – There isn’t much of a selection of messaging apps out there for Mac, so Adium it is. I was a fan of Digsby on PC, but no Mac support yet. It’s been “coming soon” for quite a while. I stopped holding my breath about a year ago.
Tweetie – I’m really looking forward to Tweetie 2, especially since Twitter purchase atebits! For now, there really isn’t a better Twitter client for Mac than Tweetie. I’ve tried a TON, and always find myself coming back.
Projects – I keep a smart folder on my dock so I can quickly locate and jump in to a specific project in TextMate.
Client files – Another smart folder, which brings me directly to the client directories on my system. Saves me a couple of clicks while navigating through Finder.
Applications – Yeah.
Parallels – Parallels installs a handy “Start menu” on your dock by default. It has actually become pretty useful, and has found its way in to my daily workflow. Obviously, as a web developer, I have to be able to hop in to Windows and deal with Internet Explorer. IETester, for Windows, makes life a little bit easier in that department.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Scott for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 31 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 30

Grace — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 15:31:06 +0000

Phill Horrocks is a web developer based in the north of England in a sunny little place called Lancashire. He is a web standards junkie, mountain biker, husband, father and profanity enthusiast – especially when dealing with Internet Explorer (aren’t we all).

I asked Phill if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a developer on a daily basis.

The Intro…

When at home I have a late ’08 Macbook Pro and at the office I have a 24in iMac and a MacPro (The Beast – mainly used for video).

The Dock…

Finder – Erm, Finder still rocks for me. People knock it and use PathFinder but, for me, it works.
Dashbaord – I actually use Dashboard in my daily routine. I check the weather, my eBay watch list and use the calculator here when my brain fails.
VLC – I use Snow Leopard and it comes with QuicktimeX. For me it’s too limiting and besides, VLC plays pretty much everything you throw at it.
Expose – When I’m working on the MacBook Pro sans external monitor, Expose really comes into it’s own with Spaces.
Spaces – I actually use HyperSpaces and this got left in the dock becuase I got used to it being there!
Mail – Mail.app is the best mail app there is. Simple. It works. It finds mail incredibly quickly and it never crashes for me. I tried Entourage but never really got on with it.
Spamsieve – Thanks to SpamSieve I now get NO spam in my inbox at all. Right out of the box it gave me in excess of 98% accuracy. Excellent software.
Safari – Safari. What can I say. This is the best browser out there. Fast. Solid. And great support for emerging technologies. My primary ‘browsing’ browser.
Firefox – Firefox is my primary development broweser due to it’s excellent add-ons. Web Developer Toolbar and Firebug are both excellent time-savers and when it comes to debugging CSS they’re second to none.
Chrome – I’ve been using Chrome since it’s early wobbly pre-alpha days in the dev channels. It’s great. It’s fast and it can only get better in the future.
Preview – Still handy for looking (quickly) at PDF’s when you can’t be bothered waiting for Acrobat to load.
Fireworks – I do 99% of my web graphics work in Fireworks. It’s MUCH easier to use for web stuff than Photoshop is and gets the job done fast. Its a great tool for wireframing too when Balsamiq isn’t quite enough.
LittleSnapper – LittleSnapper is one of those apps that comes along and you wondered how to ever lived without it. I used to use Skitch a lot for simple snaps but LittleSnapper takes it to a whole new level, especially if you store your library in your Dropbox folder so you can share it. Awesome stuff.
Tweetie – My personal favourite Twitter app. Simple, quick and elegant.
SpeedDownload – Does what it says on the tin. And very well.
Omnifocus – Omnifocus keeps me sane. I use this along with the iPhone version.
On The Job – Where Omnifocus keeps me sane, OnTheJob keeps money in my pocket!
MindNode Pro – I never used to ‘get’ why people banged on about mind-mapping until I tried it. MindNode Pro is such a nice tool. It’s small and has just enough features to get the job done. I find it a great tool for mapping out sites too.
Espresso – Just today I got rid of Coda from my dock and replaced it with Espresso v1.1 which (for me) has just surpassed Coda in functionality and speed. Such a nice editor.
WaveBoard – I was lucky enough to recieve a Google Wave invite a short while ago and while it’s a browser-based tool, WaveBoard is, essentially, just a ‘wrapper’ or Fluid-like app for it. Keeps it neat and tidy should I not have a browser window open though.
VMWare Fusion – For all those times when I must use Windows, this makes is bearable. Unfortunately IE and Actinic mean I spend a bit of time here.
Stack – Desktop – Quick access to my Desktop is essential.
Stack – User folder – I often need to just peek into my root User folder and this is where I go
Stack – Applications – For the most part I’m a keyboard junkie and I use the excellent Quicksilver as a launcher to get me around but there are times when the Dock Stack for my Applications folder is useful.
Stack – Dropbox – Stack access to my Dropbox folder – essential.
Stack – Documents – Quick document folder browsing.
Stack – Downloads – I usually keep my Downloads folder quite trim so this stack is very handy.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Phill for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check back every Tuesday for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 30 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 29

Grace — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:45:09 +0000

Michael Wilson is a 23 year old web designer based in Bournemouth, in the UK.

Michael runs a design inspiration blog and has a passion for learning new things, whether that be CSS techniques, jQuery, WordPress or UX practices.

Michael has also been involved in numerous UX research studies and is currently in the process of building his online portfolio, which will launch on January 1st 2010.

I asked Michael if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer and blogger on a daily basis.

The Intro…

The main two processes I complete on my mac are surfing the web and designing/building websites. This is why my dock is overrun with browsers and the Adobe suite. Taking a photo of my mac has also made me realize that I never use Photo Booth, iCal and vary rarely use Word and a few others so maybe I’ll have a clean up after this.

The Dock…

Finder – I very rarely actually click on this in my dock. I tend to use Spotlight to find things as it’s so good at it.
Dashboard – This is another I don’t use often, mainly for the calculator when I do.
Postbox – Last year I was having problems with Mail and I’m really glad I did now because Postbox is the best email application I have ever used. It’s worth every penny.
iCal – I never use this, I’ve never really needed a calendar in my life.
Safari – I used Safari as my main browser for a year or so but one day decided to move over to Firefox because of the array of great plug-ins for it. I still use Safari for testing though and this is the browser I have set up for my girlfriend when she wants to use my mac.
Firefox – My default browser, mainly because of firebug and xmarks. The plug-ins make firefox the best in my opinion.
Chrome – All the hype surrounding Chrome made me try it out. I’m sticking to Firefox for now but I always keep my options open.
Opera – When Opera 10 came out I thought I’d give it a whirl, i mainly use it for testing.
Billings – Billings is a great invoicing application that makes keeping track of work a synch.
iTunes – I use iTunes to keep up to date with my podcasts, which keep me informed while on my way into work.
Spotify – Spotify has got me back into music again, love it.
iPhoto – I keep my photos arranged into events with iPhoto, it’s so simple, it rarely stays open for long.
Photo Booth – I only use this if I need a quick photo for a passport of some photo ID.
Coda – Recently starting using Coda again and I’m really loving it this time. I think it may now be my coding option from now on.
Adobe Bridge – I’ve never used bridge on my mac, I use it at work all the time so I guess it’s on my home computer out of habit.
Adobe Photoshop – I use Photoshop everyday, I couldn’t live without it.
Adobe Illustrator – I use illustrator to create any vectors I may need in my web designs.
Adobe Flash – I don’t use Flash, I only have it in my dock because it’s part of the set.
Adobe Dreamweaver – A lot of people have a big problem with Dreamweaver for some reason. Up until recently I used it for all of my coding and I really like it.
Adobe InDesign – Like Flash this is rarely used, I just like showing I have them.
Adobe After Effects – I really want to learn more After Effects but my head just doesn’t seem to get video.
Word – I don’t do too much in Word but it’s there for the rare occasions I do need it.
Cyberduck – Cyberduck is the most beautifully simple FTP client there is, I love it. Must admit though that since using Coda I haven’t used Cyberduck.
Adium – I used to talk on messenger quite a lot and Adium was my favourite method of doing so. However, I use twitter now instead of messenger.
LittleSnapper – Anytime I see a design element I like I snap it and tag it in my LittleSnapper library. It realy is a great starting point for any project now.
Destroy Twitter – Destroy Twitter is my Twitter client of choice because it is so lightweight and does everything I could want it to. I have all of the growl notifications off though otherwise I’d never get any work done!

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Michael for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check back every Tuesday for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 29 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 28

Grace — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:28:08 +0000

Matthew Dawkins is a web designer based in Somerset, UK. He runs a small web business catering for small businesses, and is passionate about CSS, PHP and MODx. He manages and develops the enormous Diocese of Chelmsford web site and has a client base spread across the UK.

I asked Matthew if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer on a daily basis.

The Intro…

I have always had a soft spot for Macs, even going back to the good old Classic days. Now with a G5 PPC running Leopard, and a Mac mini running as a private web server, and an iPod in the drawer for good measure, I can confidently call myself a Mac-addict! My Dock is fairly organised at the moment, with additional folders set up on the right hand side with categorised apps, which keeps things tidy. I also split my workflow onto two Spaces, with one set up for my personal stuff and one for work.

The Dock…

Quicksilver – This is one of those apps that sits quietly in the corner, apparently not doing much, but boy do you miss it if it’s not there! I use this most frequently to launch applications that aren’t in my Dock and to quickly scale images prior to putting onto web sites.
Adium – This sits on my personal Space, and elegantly allows me to keep in touch with all my friends. Not only is it multi-protocol, but it’s also good-looking too.
Twhirl – Simple Twitter client that looks after my personal Twitter account. Tidy, no fuss, simple, but without looking too minimal.
Gmail – Actually this is cheating slightly. I’m using Fluid to display Gmail as if it were a desktop application. Simple, but it means I’ve been able to move away from Mail.app completely and rely on Gmail solely to handle my mail, without other sites getting in the way.
Skype – Skype provides me with my business phone number and voicemail, which is really useful and so much cheaper than getting a physical line installed.
Tweetie – Another Twitter client, but for my work Twitter account instead. Elegant and stylish, I wish I had more followers/followees just so I could use it more often!
Firefox – My main browser, used for development purposes. I have the usual range of developer tools installed too, and I’m using one of the Foxdie themes to make it look pretty and keep me visually inspired all day long.
Safari – For when I want a bit more speed. I also use this browser when I’m not working, just to keep things separate.
MAMP – Actually I don’t use this much any more, now that I have my old Mac mini set up as a web server, but MAMP used to allow me to develop web sites locally, and worked very well indeed.
Sequel Pro – A cunning little tool for managing MySQL databases remotely (server permitting). Beautiful interface, and so much nicer to use than phpMyAdmin.
Cyberduck – I typically use this FTP/SSH client several times a day. It’s primarily drag-and-drop, unlike the more ungainly FileZilla, which means it ‘fits’ into my desktop more cleanly.
Address Book – I have groups set up to keep my business contacts separate from friends and family, and have extra fields set up for clients’ web sites.
Google Calendar – Another Fluid app giving me an iCal replacement that I don’t have to worry about synching.
iTunes – I can’t work without music playing in the background, and iTunes usually sits on my personal Space in Mini-Mode.
iPhoto – For managing all my photos. I particularly love the Events feature.
Adobe Illustrator – I do all my design work in Illustrator. I’ve tried designing in Photoshop and Fireworks, but Illustrator allows me to more easily group objects together, align them in various ways, and put different pages and components on different layers, and just makes for a design workflow that I find easiest.
Adobe Photoshop – My workflow doesn’t usually call for me to slice designs, but Photoshop is fantastic for per-pixel editing and special effects, and is also used pretty much daily for various tasks.
Adobe Dreamweaver – I use this for all my coding. I don’t use the WYSIWYG editor, but the code highlighting and code completion are useful additions that make it perfect for my coding workflow.
Smultron – A simple little text editor, not as fancy as Dreamweaver, but it integrates with Cyberduck to allow me to effectively edit files over FTP/SSH without having to download them first (sort of).
Browsers folder – Contains all my web browsers: Camino, Firefox, Flock, OmniWeb, Opera, Safari and Stainless.
Development Tools folder – Contains various technical apps: Activity Monitor, Calculator, Cyberduck, Dreamweaver, iSVN, MAMP, MPEG Streamclip, Sequel Pro, Smultron, Terminal, TextEdit.
Adobe CreativeSuite folder – Handy links to my CS3 apps: Acrobat Professional, Fireworks, Flash, Illustrator, InDesign, Photoshop, Dreamweaver.
Web Apps folder – Shortcuts to my Fluid apps: Gmail, Google Docs, Google Reader, Google Calendar.
Office Apps folder – Various desktop publishing programs I use: Bean, Google Docs, iCal, Keynote, Excel, Powerpoint, Word, NeoOffice, Numbers, Pages, TextEdit

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Matthew for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check back every Tuesday for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 28 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 27

Grace — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 19:59:03 +0000

Charlie Maybury is a User Experience Professional based in Brighton, UK. His passion is good web design, and he is a great believer in the ‘Art of Simplicity’ to enhance a website’s ease of use.

Web Accessibility is close to his heart, and he specialises in creating and reworking websites to ensure they are not only accessible, but also to provide a positive ‘Accessible User Experience’. He writes regular updates about accessibility on his blog: Web Accessibility Rambles.

I asked Charlie if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer and UX specialist on a daily basis.

The Intro…

Although I like a minimalist design and uncluttered workspace, I also like to have my favourite programs just one click away. I like my dock to be quite small to allow me to make best use of my whole screen.

The Dock…

Finder – Helps me find my things.
Dashboard – I use Dashboard regularly for the calculator and currency converter app.
Mail – I use Mail on occasion, but generally rely on webmail these days.
Safari – Mainly used for testing websites I am building, Firefox is my browser of choice.
Address Book – No explanation needed!
iCal – I love iCal for a quick view of my appointments & social calendar!
Preview – Mainly used as a PDF viewer.
Xee – Image viewer of choice.
iTunes – I love iTunes. I am rarely without music.
iPhoto – Used for very quick and simple photo edits.
Firefox – Firefox fulfils all of my web surfing needs. I have a large array of add-ons and couldn’t survive without Firebug anymore!
Word – OK, I like Microsoft Word… don’t hold it against me.
Open Office – Open Office is fine, slow to use though.
TextEdit – I use TextEdit for quick drafts, notes or coding.
Transmission – Super quick Bit Torrent client.
Taco – A nice simple HTML editor. Used regularly.
Burn – Great simple CD/DVD burning application.
Last FM – Used to scrobble my music.
Audacity – For easy recording of verbal interviews & user tests.
iMovie – Used occasionally to edit demo’s / user tests.
GarageBand – For a bit of music fun once in a while.
GuitarRig2 – Makes my guitar playing sound good.
VLC – Great all round media player…plays anything.
Handbrake – Superb and simple video transcoder
Front Row – I like to use Front Row when using my Macbook as a media center.
Cyberduck – FTP client of choice. Nice and easy to use.
Adobe Reader – For viewing those long PDF reports.
Spaces – Nice for separating my work and play.
Adium – My ‘always on’ IM application
Skype – Skype is vital for those long distance calls, without the huge cost!
GIMP – Open Source photo manipulation package. I prefer GIMP to Photoshop at the moment.
Time Machine – It’s like my digital life insurance!
DivX Player – Used occasionally if VLC is not playing ball.
System Preferences – I like to have a quick link to my prefs in my dock.
Excel – Unfortunately, I still use Excel to capture research results, although I hate every minute of it.
Powerpoint – Powerpoint is still my presentation package of choice.
Microsoft Messenger – My MSN IM application is used if Adium is struggling.
Quicksilver – I use Quicksilver almost constantly to quickly launch apps and documents using the keyboard.
Parallels – Allows me to test designs in Window’s XP if necessary.
Smultron – I really like Smultron, it fulfils all my programming needs.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Charlie for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check back every Tuesday for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 27 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 26

Grace — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 19:53:54 +0000

Daniel Apt is a young web designer and developer based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Besides web design and development, most of his time is occupied by school. Daniel has currently been working with web technologies for the past 5 years and also has written articles for Activetuts+.

I asked Daniel if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer and developer on a daily basis.

The Intro…

I’m still very new to a mac, I’m the proud owner of a 24-inch iMac for about half a year, yet already now I feel as if I’ve been using it for years. I even feel alienated when I’m sitting behind a windows pc! I try to keep my dock consistent, and only have the apps I use often on it, the apps I don’t use often I can find using spotlight. I try to keep certain apps next to each other, for example the ones for school work or for web development.

The Dock…

Finder – The first apps in my dock are my browsing apps, which are Finder, LittleSnapper and Font Book. Where would I be without my dear Finder? Some people don’t realize how important Finder actually is, but we use it everyday to save, find and organize our files. All my files are organized in folders and I often use color labels. Using Finder to its full capabilities is the best tip for working in a more organized way.
LittleSnapper – I won this app from Grace’s big productivity app giveaway (thanks Grace). I use it to make screenshots and edit them. I love how easy it is to organize my screenshots with LittleSnapper. The most amazing is the image editor, it makes it so easy to draw arrows, place notes and more!
Font Book – The last of my browsing apps is Font Book. I don’t use any expensive font management software, Font Book is fine. The only thing that I need is to be able to see which fonts I have and that I can organize those fonts, so Font Book is precisely what I need.
Schoolmagazine – The apps that I use for school are Schoolmagazine and Papers. Schoolmagazine is an app created with Fluid, which is an online portal where we do all the management for our school’s paper.
Papers – Sadly I use Papers mostly for school, yeah, boring essays and such. So I associate Papers with schoolwork, sadly, because it’s actually a great app. I also use it to write my invoices (yeah, that’s right, no fancy invoicing app).
iTunes – Well ok, iTunes doesn’t really fit in a category, so I just randomly placed it in my dock. While working I must listen to music, I prefer to listen to calming ambient music, which creates this great working enviroment.
Firefox – Just like iTunes, Firefox doesn’t fit in a category. Firefox is my preferred browser of choice, it might be slower compared to the other browsers on my dock, but it really makes my work a lot easier with all the great addons.
Gmail – Now come my mailing apps, which are Gmail and IG Mail. Gmail is an app created with Fluid. I love Gmail, it’s fast, it has a nifty user interface, and together with offline Gmail it’s perfect for me.
IG Mail – My school has its own email service, which is powered by Novel Groupwise. If you’re curious what IG stands for, it’s (St.) Ignatius Gymnasium, which is a great school in Amsterdam.
Concentrate – Now come the work management apps, which are Concentrate, iClockr and Taskpaper. Concentrate is the second app that I got from Grace’s giveaway, I use it when I really want to focus on a project for an hour or so.
iClockr – Even when I’m working on a project that won’t be payed by the hour, I like to see how much time I spend working on a project, this gives me a better idea how much I should ask for a project. And of course I use it also if I do get payed by the hour.
TaskPaper – This it the third and last app I’ve won from Grace’s giveaway. I use it to literally write all my tasks down, school stuff, personal stuff, work stuff, all tasks are over-organized into projects.
MAMP – MAMP, Sequel Pro and Coda are my web development apps. I find MAMP the easiest way to run a local server on my mac, installation was so easy, and I’ve never had problems with it.
Sequel Pro – Even though MAMP is great, phpMyAdmin isn’t that great for looking through MySQL databases, so I use Sequel Pro for looking up records in MySQL databases.
Coda – Coda is my preferred code editor, it’s simple, it’s fast and I love the simplicity of working with FTP.
Flash CS4 – Flash, Photoshop and InDesign are my graphics apps. Well Flash is actually a bit between graphics and development. Flash is the program that got me started with web design/development. I started with Flash MX 2004, and first just made little animations where stickmen were fighting each other. But later I discovered you could program, and got hooked to that. Now I’ve been using Flash for 5 years.
Photoshop CS4 – Before I start working on a website, I design it in Photoshop, I never got into FireWorks, so I’m just sticking to Photoshop. Designing a mockup in Photoshopis just part of my workflow.
InDesign CS4 – I recently became the graphic designer of my school’s paper, so we’re working on a major redesign. Of course for layout and print, InDesign is the app to use.
Adium – Adium and Tweetie are my social apps. Adium is neatest looking app for using MSN and I enjoy using it.
Tweetie – Actually the only thing that’s constantly changing is my twitter client, for now I have settled with Tweetie. Its design is elegant it’s fast and the only reason I wasn’t using it was because I thought it didn’t have retweet support (it does, just right-click on the tweet).
Terminal – Terminal is also a lonely ranger that doesn’t really fit in a category. The only thing I use the Terminal for is to use Git, which I just recently started using, it’s great and very easy to use, you just need to spend a small amount of time to master it.

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Daniel for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check back every Tuesday for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 26 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 25

Grace — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 15:32:17 +0000

Ryan Olson is a web designer and developer based in the Bay Area, CA. Ryan is an aspiring full-time freelancer and leaves and breathes the internet and his Macbook Pro. Just the type of person I love to feature here on the Dock Series!

I asked Ryan if he would give us the lowdown on the applications he relies upon as a designer and developer on a daily basis.

The Intro…

I am a full fledged Mac addict, and proud of it. Addicted as well to Twitter, and tinychat, and video games, and…wow I need help.

I love my Mac more and get shaky when we are apart. I work with a 15″ Macbook Pro and plug into a 24″ Dell LCD when working at home. Admittedly I am a fairly new Mac user, only the past two years, but it feels as though we were split apart at birth, and I am finally home.

The Dock…

Finder – It wont leave the dock!
Postbox – Mail client that rocks. Nicely organized and powerful features.
Things – Lets me know all the things I should be doing.
Firefox – Web browser of choice, firebug is a must add-on.
Skype – My favorite IM client, very capable chat and voice.
iChat – For the times I can’t use Skype.
Linkinus – IRC client, beautiful and tons of features.
Tweetie – Twitter! Still my favorite tweeting app, so sleek, so shiny.
Terminal – Because the command line is fun. No, really.
Textmate – My personal text editing ninja.
CSS Edit – Awesome CSS editor with real time live preview as you edit!
Transmit – Best. FTP. Ever. Very fast, very clean.
xScope – So useful, unobtrusive screen rulers and tools.
Font Book – Apple’s FontBook, works great for me.
Photoshop CS4 – For making animated sparkle gifs. Wait, I mean…
Final Cut Pro – Best app for video editing, so many features.
Motion – 3-D utility app from Final Cut Studio.
Screenflow – For screen casting tutorials, there is none better.
RegEXr – Very helpful tool for finding and building Regular Expressions.
Easy Batch Photo – Simple to use bulk image re-sizer, very handy.
Name Mangler – Fast and easy file name changer, many options.
Toast – Burns everything, except toast, ironically…
Vimeo Uploader – Handy and fast uploader to get my vids to Vimeo.
Flickr Uploader – Sending pics on the fly!

———————————————————————————————————–
A huge thanks to Ryan for taking time out to take part in the Dock Series.

If you would like to be featured in the Dock Series simply:

Download the Dock Series Template.
Email it along with the necessary images to: hi [at] gracesmith.co.uk.

Check out the other creatives in the series.

With more amazing creatives lined up, make sure to check back every Tuesday for the latest Dock Series installment.

Show Me Your Dock Series! Part 25 is a post from: Hi, I'm Grace Smith

Big App Giveaway Code: ProductivityRocks