My Computing Setup
++ I'm generally very particular about how I use my computer and the software that runs on it. I + don't always configure my tools in the most "user-friendly" way, but rather the most efficient + way for me. In other words, I prefer function over form -- if something can be done faster in a + terminal, I wouldn't use the GUI version. I also generally prefer free software, as in software + which respects the four essential freedoms. However, I'm not a fanatic, and I run proprietary blobs in my firmware and drivers to get my hardware + to function properly. +
+First, some brief hardware details
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- Intel Core i7-13700KF +
- RTX 4080 (Founder's Edition) +
- 32GB DDR5 memory at 5200 mt/s +
+ The other hardware details of my computer are not particularly interesting. I do have an AIO + water cooler. +
+Software
++ I run Arch Linux with the + Hyprland desktop environment. My OS choice is mostly + pragmatic, I don't feel strong allegiances to any particular distro. I simply use Arch as it + lets me configure my system exactly how I want and has an up to date and large user package + repository. I've also been interested in looking into NixOS, + but I don't yet have 40 hours per week to configure my operating system, unfortunately. I use + Hyprland because: +
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- + Tiling window managers are infinitely superior and anyone who disagrees has never experienced + productivity. + +
- + Hyprland implements most modern Wayland features which is very important as I'm on Nvidia. + +
I also keep a Windows installation around, mainly for gaming.
+Code editing
++ One of the most used pieces of software on a developer's computer is their text editor, so I + spent a lot of time settling on one. In the past, I used Visual Studio Code, but I've since switched to + Neovim. VS Code is a fine editor and I recommend it to anyone + new to programming, but it just doesn't make sense for me to run a full electron app when I + don't need any of the fancy GUI features and I can work faster in Neovim. Modern code editing + has mostly become editor-agnostic anyways with the advent of + LSP, so most of the + important features are available in practically every editor anyways. +
+As for my terminal, my main priorities (in order) are:
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- Performance +
- Font rendering quality and support (ligatures, etc) +
- Additional quality of life features +
+ Since my editor (Neovim) runs purely in a terminal, performance is the most important since any + perceptible latency or lag quickly becomes extremely annoying. Otherwise, it would probably + shift down to the bottom of the list. +
++ I've tried kitty and + Alacritty but ended up settling on kitty. Although Alacritty + (allegedly) has better performance, kitty is practically the same in day-to-day use (and I heard + it has better latency, too). I ended up choosing kitty mainly due to its more versatile configuration + as well as support for font ligatures. It also has tabs and native multiplexing, which the maintainers + of Alacritty refuse to support (which is fine, with tmux or zellij, but native is nice to have). +
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