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-title = "Tools I endorse"

+title = "My toolkit"

 date = 2026-03-25

 +++

 

-Computing is here to stay and can be used to enhance or take away from life. I am also biased towards change.

+Technology has transformed our lives. However, sometimes it overextend their reach into certain areas of my life. There I draw clear boundaries on what my use cases are where computers, phones and other general purpose devices can help me. These are listed below in the order of priority.

 

-It is also part of my life in a way enhances and drains from it. I am a technology addict and I find it fun to tweak things here and there all the me time. The longer I am struggling with this, the longer it takes for me to work on things that matter to me.

+1. Communication

+2. Services

+3. Documents

+4. Engineering

+5. Media

+6. Time Management

 

-Using technology brings problems as well which I need to manage, such as security, ads and passwords. I use Adguard VPN and Bitwarden for each of these respectively.

+I have a phone and a backup along with a laptop and a tablet which acts as its back to achieve these use cases. Before using any of these though, I recommend everyone to setup a password manager. I use [Bitwarden](https://bitwarden.com). Use an ad blocker as well. This will reduce distractions when browsing the internet. I recommend [uBlock](https://ublockorigin.com). Any system I create:

 

-Therefore, here I am making a list of things that technology actually helps me with in the order of importance to me. This can guide me in what exactly I need:

+## Must haves

 

-1. Communication: Calls, texts and emails

-2. Knowledge Management: Text and number crunching

-3. Engineering tools: System design and programming

-4. Media consumption: Audio, images, video, and gaming

-5. Accessing services: Navigation, banking and shopping

-6. Time Management: Calendar and reminders

+I _communicate_ with family and friends via text messages and calls. I prefer using Signal for messaging but also use Whatsapp. I also have an email attached to my domain and a separate email address which I fill in when I don't want to provide my primary one. I believe that email is a better form of communication that instant messaging aas it respects the time of the correspondents. Many services in the modern world are also becoming more digital. Governmental agencies, banking, navigation or online only stores are also important _services_ that I need to access.

 

-Based on the requirements I have, I can make a list of software that I need.

+## Should haves

 

-## Communication

+Managing documents is much easier with a digital device. Once digitized they are always available and can be backed up. I use a personal network attached storage (NAS) and iCloud for this. I also cannot live without the use of engineering tools that have made life much easier. These are tools for programming, hardware and mechanical design. If you want to learn something from scratch, I highly recommend Python, KiCAD and OpenSCAD respectively. I also use typesetting tools such as LaTeX or Typst to generate high quality PDFs to share with others. [Ipe](https://ipe.otfried.org) is also a great tool to augment the others for diagrams. I try to stay away from tools that could take my data hostage via proprietary formats or other forms of lock in. I use plain text via Markdown when possible. I prefer to use VS Code for programming or NeoVim for text documents. I also generate HTML using hugo to crates websites such as this to store information that I share with others. I have digital music and images that I also store on iCloud and my NAS so that I can stream from it to many devices. I keep this locked behind a Tailnet to precent unauthorized access.

 

-For communication, I use calls and texts via a phone along with internet versions of this via Signal. For email, I use my own domain name. I can be reached at me@karanj.com for most purposes but I have a throw away email to subscribe for newsletters and for services that I don’t trust. I need at least the calls accessible at all times for emergencies so it need to be part of my everyday cary.

+## Could haves

 

-## Time Management and Services

-

-For reminders and calendars, I am not picky, anything goes. I don’t care for retaining it perpetually as well so it doesn’t need to be backed up. It does need to be accessible to me all the time, it has to be part of my everyday cary. Certain services such as banking and navigation also need to be available at all time. Other services such as shopping is less important. For shopping, I pay for Amazon Prime as it saves me money overall when ordering things.

-

-## Images

-

-I want to be able to store photos and search through them. I want to use digital frames to display photos in the house. But I do care about photos and need to find a way to back things up to two separate drive. In this case personal videos are also considered in the image category. It helps to have this also all the time to show others but isn’t necessary.

-

-## Gaming

-I am not a gamer, I just enjoy games. This means that a dedicated PC isn’t worth it for me. Gaming is also more convenient with a console. I don’t care much about games either, so I don’t want to back up or buy physical copies of games. I also don’t need this all the time so this can be at home.

-

-## Videos

-I want to download movies and TV shows but store only the ones that really matter to me. These items should be available specifically at home and having this with me is a bonus. I don’t need this to be backed up too much. Maybe only my favourite movies. When possible I use VLC to watch videos as I like the story behind it and it is open-source. I also pay for YouTube because I find the service worth it. But I am not a fan of Google so want to minimise the amount I services I use them for because:

-

-* Google maps destroys restaurants.

-

-## Audio

-

-I use Apple Music to listen to music because of their extensive catalogue and better pay for musicians compared to Spotify. But this isn’t important to me. I can switch services at any time. But music matters to me so I do want to make physical copies that I have at home.

-

-## Engineering Tools

-

-I use specialized software for:

-

-- Programming

-- Design: OpenSCAD and KiCAD

-

-## Knowledge Management

-

-Managing information is the most important part of my life. I care a lot about intellectual growth and I need this part of my life to work smoothly. I can use programming to crunch numbers.

-

-### Obsidian

-

-Plain text is [unreasonably effective](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WgV6M1LyfNY) in organizing information. Markdown adds a bit of syntax to keep things cleaner and easier to read. Obsidian uses markdown and adds the functionality to link articles. Things cannot get better than this. It also helps study and revision which is extremely important to retain information and recall when needed. It is accessible across all platforms and works on more or less any device. I pay for their sync feature because of how seamless it is. I also back this up to two separate drives. The same ones used for photos.

-I tried using plain text documents via git and also Apple Notes and struggled with both of them. The first had issues with accessibility on my phone and the second had horrible user experience.

-

-### Typst / LaTeX

-

-Typst is a wonderful effort to reimagine LaTeX for the modern world. I can create beautiful looking CVs, letters, reports, books and presentation. The most popular option and the one used by journal however is LaTeX. I therefore need to have this available. 

-

-### Ipe

-

-[Ipe](https://ipe.otfried.org) creates amazing block diagrams. When we have a complicated diagram, the basic packages for both Typst and LaTeX don’t cut it. Follow this [guide](https://algo.win.tue.nl/tutorials/ipe/). It allows for automatic conversion to other formats on saves by changes the [prefs.lua](https://mailman.science.uu.nl/pipermail/ipe-discuss/2011-July/001344.html) and setting the [auto export](https://mailman.science.uu.nl/pipermail/ipe-discuss/2011-July/001342.html). There is also a useful utility that can [batch convert](https://otfried.github.io/ipe/94_commandline_programs.html#ipetoipe-converting-ipe-file-formats) all your .ipe files.
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+I am not picky with reminders and a calendar. I use iCloud for now as I don't mind loosing this information. I also store movies and TV shows on my NAS which allows me to consume and own my media collection. I occasionally game for which I use a Playstation 5.
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