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Vaclav Mlejnsky
Vaclav Mlejnsky

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What productivity tools are you using?

Hey folks!

I think most of the developers like to explore different tooling to make them more productive. Tools like Vim or Emacs seems like proof of this (not commenting on their learning curve though).

One of the things developers spend most of their is search. We read different studies concluding that devs spend about 15% of their time just typing queries into Google. My co-founder and I care about developers' productivity a lot and we think there should be a better solution.
We started building Devbook. Devbook is a search engine for developers. We are starting with a crude initial version that allows you to search in docs, Stack Overflow, and public GitHub code using a single input (more resources coming soon!). It's a desktop app that works similar to spotlight we the focus on being able to control using just a keyboard and not getting in your way.
We have all kinds of developers using Devbook. There beginners, students, or skilled senior devs from companies like Amazon.

You can download Devbook here. For now, it's completely free.

Would love to know what do you think about Devbook!

Also, I'd be interested to know what tools and services are you using to make you more productive? Share your stack!

Top comments (8)

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valentatomas profile image
ValentaTomas

I really like Alfred! It's also similar to Spotlight, but it's more about executing scripts and workflows - from emptying trash, switching scroll direction, to executing custom deployment scripts.

I also recommend giving GitHub actions a look - I think they are the fastest way to start with CI/CD and you can save a lot of time (and headache) with a minimum starting investment.

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mlejva profile image
Vaclav Mlejnsky • Edited

Happy to answer any question folks. Feel free to ask!

My productivity stack:

  • Devbook (obviously)
  • Vim - I recently switched. The initial learning curve was really steep but once you get over it it's really great.
  • Notes.app
  • Obsidian - similar to Roam but with a free tier and with support for markdown.
  • Sticking to a single language on both frontend and backend if possible. We are using Typescript for both our server and frontend. One of the advantages is for example that everyone on the team can edit any code and fully implement features.
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vip3rousmango profile image
Al Romano

Cool tool but I don't see why I would use this over DuckDuckGo's !bang search? I can search all of these things and more without having to download a desktop application... Also, setting DDG as the default search turns any browser into an instant search with the !bang operators.

Productivity Stack on Win10 Pro PC,

  • Sizzy.co App - Best developer browser/tool I've used (front-end focus). Includes Internal Reference Browser and !cmd helper that appears to do what DevBook does built-in
  • Default Browser: Vivaldi
  • devdocs.io
  • Hyper Terminal running Powershell v7.2
  • SolarPuTTY

  • Visual Studio Code /w 60 plugins ... oof.

  • Onivim 2 - backup IDE/text editor that feels like VSC+VIM had a baby

  • Notion

  • Todoist

  • Gmail + Streak CRM, Grammarly, Calendly Add-ons

  • Whereby (replaced Zoom)

  • Loom (Video/Screenshare presentations)

  • Slack (being freelance it's to notify me of stuffs, webhooks - rarely for actual chat)

  • Affinity Suite for Design (Photo, Design, Publisher)

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Alexandre Amado de Castro

Bear
Todoist
Spark

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bekicot profile image
Yana Agun Siswanto

vim + tmux + firefox

I used dash & karabiner in the past. But, no longer able to use it since I'm moving to linux. I really wish they support linux in the Future.

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Chad Adams

Would be better if Devbook was a web app so I don’t have to download it. Also would be cool if you did simething like this devhints.io/

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zoebourque

My go to productivity tools:

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khimaira profile image
Khimaira

I love it! is my understand that you are working on creating a VS code plugin, that is nice. Please keep supporting the other standalone app too. Is very convenient.