How I work

Lenovo IdeaPad L340

i5-9300H, GTX 1050, 8GB DDR5, 156GB NVMe + 1TB HDD. Old but punches way above its weight. Handles RDR2, God of War, and full dev workloads without complaint.

Redgear Semi-Mechanical Keyboard

Exact model TBD. Tactile enough to get the job done.

Mouse

Exact model TBD.

Cosmic Byte Bliss Controller

Gamepad of choice. The best.

Linux (Ubuntu)

Primary OS. Where all serious work happens.

pnpm

Faster installs, less disk usage than npm. Default package manager.

Ghostty

Fast, GPU-accelerated terminal. Newer addition, quickly became a go-to.

Terminator

Multi-pane terminal. Useful when running multiple processes side by side.

VS Code Built-in

For quick commands without leaving the editor.

zsh

Shell of choice with custom aliases and plugins.

VS Code

Primary editor. Fast, extensible, ecosystem is unmatched.

Git

Version control. The foundation of every project.

Lefthook

Git hooks runner. Enforces quality before every commit.

Prettier

Auto-formats everything JS/TS. Removes style debates from code review.

ESLint

Catches real bugs, not just style. TypeScript-aware rules.

Laravel Pint

Laravel's PHP code style fixer. Keeps PHP projects formatted consistently.

Peacock

Color-codes editor windows so multiple open projects are distinguishable at a glance.

Laravel (Official)

Official Laravel support: routes, views, Blade, the works.

PHP DevSense

IntelliSense, debugging, and refactoring for PHP. Indispensable.

Remote SSH

Edit code on remote servers as if it were local.

ESLint

Inline JS/TS lint errors with format-on-save.

Laravel Pint

Kept separate from ESLint so PHP formatting follows project Pint config without conflicts.

Material Icon Theme

File and folder icons that make the tree scannable.

Claude Sonnet

Daily driver. Balanced speed and depth for code and engineering tasks.

Claude Opus

Reserved for complex problems where depth matters more than speed.

ChatGPT

General content generation, writing, and quick non-code questions.

Cursor

Used occasionally when I want a different flow for AI-in-editor.

Antigravity (Gemini Flash)

Google's AI-powered IDE running Gemini Flash. Fast iteration for lighter tasks.

TypeScript

Default for all new projects. Catches entire categories of bugs at author time.

PHP

Most of my professional backend work lives here. Laravel makes it genuinely good.

Python

AI/ML workflows, data scripts, automation. Right tool for the right job.

JavaScript

Frontend and Node.js. Still the language of the web.

Laravel

Best PHP framework. Convention over configuration done right.

Next.js

React for production. This site is built on it. SSR, routing, everything included.

React

Primary UI library. Component model and ecosystem still unbeatable.

Express.js

Minimal Node.js server. Great for APIs and microservices.

Vue.js

Used at work. Gentler learning curve, excellent for teams.

Tailwind CSS

Utility-first CSS. Ship UI faster without naming things.

PostgreSQL

Preferred relational DB for new projects. Reliable and feature-rich.

MySQL

Widely used across client and legacy projects.

MongoDB

Document store for flexible, schema-optional use cases.

Redis

Caching, rate limiting, queues, pub/sub. Does a lot of heavy lifting.

Prisma

ORM for TypeScript projects. Type-safe queries and clean migrations.

Chrome

Primary browser. Dev tools are unmatched.

Brave

Secondary browser. Built-in ad blocking for clean browsing sessions.

AdBlock

Blocks ads across the web. Chrome only — Brave handles it natively.

JSON Viewer Pro

Renders JSON responses as a readable, collapsible tree.

Cookie Editor

Inspect and edit cookies on any site.

GNOME Shell Integration

Install GNOME extensions directly from the browser.

React Developer Tools

Inspect component trees, props, and state.

Postman

API exploration and testing. Saved collections for every project.

Insomnia

Lighter alternative when I want something less bloated than Postman.

Vitest

Fast unit testing for TypeScript. Vite-powered, great DX.

PHPUnit

Standard for PHP/Laravel. Unit and feature tests.

Docker

Containerization for dev and prod. Every serious project gets a Dockerfile.

GitHub Actions

CI/CD. Tests, linting, and deployment pipelines triggered on every push.

Self-Hosted GitHub Runners

For builds that need beefier hardware or private network access.

Nginx

Reverse proxy and web server. Default choice for most deployments.

HAProxy

Load balancing for high-traffic, high-availability setups.

AWS

S3, EC2, and managed services. Primary cloud provider.

Linux Servers

Ubuntu/Debian in production. Comfortable with server management from scratch.

Custom Notes App

Built into this site behind protected routes. My second brain lives where my work lives.

Google Workspace

Email, docs, and meetings at work.