Default Apps

Here I maintain a list of the default applications that I regularly use. To see lists from other members of the indieweb, see the App Defaults page maintained by Robb Knight.

📧 Email

I am only part way through migrating my email provider out of iCloud. I currently use Apple Mail for emails received in to my legacy icloud addresses, and Proton for email being received at this domain.

🌐 Browser

I use Orion from Kagi as my main browser. I also use Vivaldi as a backup browser, particularly for some sites that require a chromium based browser to work fully - like Scrimba.

📅 Calendar

I currently use Apple Calendars at home, Outlook calendars at work, with a subscription to Morgen to time block tasks from my Obsidian based productivity system.

🗃️ Cloud Storage

Again, part way through reducing my reliance on Apple, my cloud storage is largely icloud, but with curated content slowly being migrated across to Proton Drive.

🐘Mastodon

A recent discovery, I currently use the Phanpy web app to keep up with my personal server.

💬 Messaging

I'm not really happy with messaging, which just feels all over the place.

I'd love to get all of my private correspondence into something like Signal, but in reality I'm never getting my family over there. I primarily message via Apple messages, and WhatsApp where I cannot. I could probably drop WhatsApp relatively easily reverting to actual phone calls and SMS.

Beyond that I am in an array of different discord servers for co-ordinating virtual cycling and learning activities, and I have to keep an eye on one, cough, faceworld page to keep up with what is happening and when in my running club.

🏞️ Photo Management

Currently all in Apple Photos, though will be archiving to Proton Drive as part of the transition described earlier.

📝 Note Taking

I take notes in Obsidian, subscribing to Obsidian Sync to keep my notes synchronised across all of my home and work devices.

✅ Task Management

I manage tasks within my obsidian vault, using a blueprint customised from Chris Ferdinandi.

🛜 Feed Reader

I've been subscribing to Unread for a number of years, but I also really like the look and feel of Croissant - and the ability to save an article into my obsidian notebook directly from the PWA.

📰 News

I subscribe to the Guardian as my primary source of news, as well as keeping up with the BBC who I have barely forgiven for their indyRef bias.

🔓 Security

I use Proton VPN to keep my network communications secure, Proton Pass as password manager, and Proton Authenticator to provide 2FA authentication codes.

🔎 Search

I subscribe to Kagi to provide clean, ad-free search results with small-web coverage.

🔖 Bookmarks

I have started to organise bookmarks publicly on my website.

👨‍💻 Code Editor

I'm writing this article in Panic's wonderful Nova. I use vscodium on any of my chromebooks, or at work.

💶 Finance

I currently use Snoop to keep track of my finances. I need this less now than I have done as all of my large expenses now basically disappear on pay day every month - so the mental arithmetic is now much easier than it was.