I have had development environments on all the major platforms (Windows, varying flavors of Linux, and OS X) and I have to say, OS X wins by a mile. You can cobble together a relatively similar environment on Windows and Linux, but it never quite feels like it works right. On OS X, everything fits together nicely.
I had taken a few screenshots to help demonstrate, but they don’t do it justice. So I took a video with my new Kodak Playsport. You can’t really *read* what’s on the screen, but you can get the idea. Choose 720p for more clarity.
Software Featured
- RubyMine 2
- VIM w/ NERDTree Addon
- iTerm for full screen terminal
- Sequel Pro
I use Spaces to organize.
Space 1
- Browsers (Safari and Firefox with Firebug and Firecookie)
- AdiumX (IM)
- Colloquy (IRC)
- RubyMine
Space 2
- Terminals – I keep the project open in NERDtree so I can continue to work even if I’m watching a process (i.e. migrations, tests, or DB Import) I can still work. In this video I’m running a test db import and cloning a svn repository in git.
Space 3
- Sequel Pro – I highly recommend this piece of software. I can get around the MySQL command prompt as quick as the next guy, but most of the time, I can get the job done in a nice UI, with plenty of convenience features.
Space 4
- Calendar
I think this system works very well and is pretty efficient, once you get used to switching back and forth between RubyMine and VIM anyways. Switch to 720p for more clarity.
The vimoutliner plugin is pretty awesome too..
I’ll check it out
‘vimium’ for chrome is great.
Basically lets me drive the browser using the keyboard, including scrolling and clicking links.
It also lets me ‘undo’ closing a tab.
SizeUp gives nice keyboard shortcuts for resizing windows and moving them between displays.
iterm and screen are great too, though you may need dick around to get 256 colors.
Oh yeah! I remember vimoutliner!