I rely on my MacBook Pro for both life and work. As such, I have a wide range of apps installed for business administration, software development, design, photography, and everything in between. Here’s a list of the apps I use heavily, regardless of the project I’m working on at the moment.

Alfred 5

Alfred 5 is a powerful Spotlight replacement for Mac. It offers file search, shortcuts, dictionary, and recently, AI integration. The best thing about Alfred is its customisability. Some of the workflows I use the most are:

  • Div: Allows quick window tiling.
  • Theme: A theme switcher for Mac. Great for switching themes based on lighting rather than the time of day.
  • Timer: A simple and usable timer. I use it multiple times a day as part of my time-boxing productivity technique.
  • World Clock: Configured to give me ISO timestamps, such as 2024-04-30T20:00:13+09:00, used in my work journal in Obsidian (more on this below).

Obsidian

Obsidian is a fantastic multi-platform writing app, though the mobile app performance can be limited for my vault with over 10,000 notes. I’ve been using it for just over a year.

Like Alfred, the customisability of Obsidian tempted me to switch from other note-taking apps. I prefer it over Notion for creating a structured web of knowledge or work logs that I’ll want to remember in the future. While I still use Notion for its database and automation features, for my knowledge dump, it’s Obsidian all the way.

Here’s how I use Obsidian:

  1. Daily Notes: Contains timestamped logs of important work and related conversations. I often refer to Slack or other service URLs for easy tracking.
  2. Work Log Notes: Includes long-lasting, complex tasks, such as product development or financial modeling. I capture everything—from my thoughts to screen captures of important information or milestones. This makes it easier to resume after interruptions and creates a draft instruction document for colleagues.
  3. Knowledge and Keyword Notes: Contains technical terms and other proper nouns, including people.

I also maintain a mission-specific web of notes as a causal network model to help remedy any health and/or energy issues. After a year of daily use, Obsidian is now my go-to place for finding “that thing from a while back.”

Contexts

Contexts is an application switcher for Mac that lets you search for and close windows using only your keyboard. Its clean design and lack of fancy animations make it a great upgrade over the stock app switcher, in my opinion.

CleanShot X

Screenshots are a great way to document information for yourself or others. CleanShot X allows you to quickly capture the whole screen, a window, or a specific part of the canvas, add notations, and paste it into any app. It’s a significant upgrade to the stock macOS experience, and I highly recommend it to everyone, even those who aren’t particularly tech-savvy.

Endel

Endel is a soundscape app that plays personalised audio based on the type of task you’re engaged in. Think of it as a supercharged white noise app. During my university years, I discovered I could push myself into a creative mode while in the shower, often composing music or other ideas in those few minutes. Later, as a software engineer, I found that white noise helps me focus better than popular or classical music. I’ve tried various white noise apps before settling on Endel. The sound it produces is pleasant, immersive and expansive. I use Endel every workday to enhance my focus during strategy, engineering, or operational routines.