I cribbed the title for this post from Jack Baty. I enjoy taking a personal inventory of what I use and like and why not share it with others too.

Computing Devices

• iPad Pro 12.9” with SmartKeyboard & Apple Pencil (2018)
• iMac 27″ with 32GB RAM and Radeon Pro 5500 XT (2020 model)
• iPhone X
• Fitness tracker++: Apple Watch 4
• Synology ds416play for Plex server, storage, backups, security cameras and Docker
• Synology RT2600ac – our router, WiFi and firewall/security device; it has a great UI; added a MR220ac for mesh
• Epson Expression XP-960 – great, and reliable, all purpose printer/scanner
• MacBook Air, 13″ (M1) - our son’s
• Home built gaming PC with Ryzen 7 3700X and RX 5600 XT OC
• Dell 13” Ultrabook - our daughter’s

Computing Services

• Duck Duck Go – for your own sake, don’t use Google search which harvests every thing you do
• iCloud – Mail, document syncing across devices, photo storage/sharing, cloud backups
• 1Password – it does a lot more than just save passwords, I highly recommend this tool. We subscribe to the family plan so we can share passwords and other information, as appropriate, securely.
• Feedbin– my RSS reader these days. I like that I can read Twitter posts from key people but wish it had a native iOS app
• iTunes – we have Family sharing as well as Music match
• ProtonVPN – from the makers of Protonmail

Software

• Affinity Pro – a nifty and powerful photo editor and PhotoShop alternative for iOS and macOS, also affordable
• Apple’s Notes app & PDFs in iCloud on macOS and iOS for research and archiving info in a searchable format
• Things3 – my favorite task manager and long term planner on iOS and macOS
• Keyboard Maestro – macOS automation tool which for my needs is much better than TextExpander
• Shortcuts – completely different from KM but does help automation on iOS
• Subler – easy to use macOS tool for editing the metadata on video files, like family videos, making it easy to load them in iTunes and Plex
• FileBot – a macOS batch file renamed to make Plex and other apps happy with files/folders for multimedia content; not easy to use but powerful
• iMovie and SnapThread for Live Photo type videos (SnapThread is an iOS tool)
• Safari – for web browsing; friends don’t let friends use Chrome
• Banktivity + Numbers – financial planning, budgeting etc that works on macOS, iPads and iPhones
• Arq backups – backs up all devices to my NAS, an offline disk as well as offsite
• Micro.blog – my main social site and blogging toolset, workable across all platforms
• RadarScope – real weather radar on iOS, AppleTV and macOS; used by professional all across the country
• HomeKit – home automation technology
• TabsHD – for finding and displaying guitar tabs; I don’t see the app in the App Store any more but the company still produces tabs
• iStats 6 – for monitoring macOS locally; I think this is a lovely app
• VS Code – editor/IDE for IoT development, JSON data edits, etc on macOS
• Xcode – it is what it is
• iTerm2 – a powerful macOS tool for accessing command lines both on a local Mac as well as devices across the great wide world
• Discord – another tool for communication within a community but has a broader base, e.g. popular with gamers and because of that voice chat is featured as well as text
• Fitzring – for circuit design on macOS

Other Devices & Services

• Taylor Acoustic Guitar limited edition 414ce with Rosewood top
• Fishman mini amp – portable amp for acoustic guitars
• Rigol Oscilloscope – affordable and powerful ‘scope
• Hakko Soldering Station – it’s worth it, this is a tool where cheap equals bad
• Gaming consoles: Switch, PS5, Xbox 360, Wii (I have kids…)
• “Smart TVs”: smattering of Apple TV boxes
• HomeKit home automation with devices from Lutron, Elgato Eve, iHome and Wemo
• A range of micro controller devices: A few Arduinos, a number of Adafruit Feathers, a couple of Raspberry Pis, etc
• Amazon Prime
• Entertainment: Apple TV+, YouTube TV, Viki (Asian, mostly Korean, fare), Amazon Prime Video, Plex Pass