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I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

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Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#71

What's the solution for when "the cloud" loses your files and the ToS says "so sorry, we'll try harder next time - here's next month's bill"? When I keep my files locally, the only person I have to blame for losing them is myself. Out in "the cloud", there's quite literally nothing that can be done to recover my data.

You can "quite literally" keep your data in two places in the cloud at once.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#72

I can't deny that this is a cool setup but I can't see it being useful for long. I personally need to see multiples windows simultaneously as I work. Swiping over can't cut it for very long. But good for you, man. To each his own I suppose.

I must confess, I did wonder about adding a second iPad for browsing documentation, or maybe one of the new kindles... I went through a phase of using multiple monitors all the time. After a year or so I came to the conclusion that alt-tab is quicker and easier than looking at another physical screen. Swiping isn't; I wish alt-tab worked in iOS. Still, it's close and it stops me checking my mail too often.

I think this is one of the places where Win8's tablet interface will gain fans. I've seen the developer preview and being able to snap windows to the side and get a "mini mode" (or whatever it's called) is really cool.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#73
post #36

For anyone who spends their day (or most of some days) in a terminal connected to a remote server, I can't recommend using GNU Screen enough (brief tutorial: http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/3/9/16838/14935 ). I've worked almost exclusively on remote servers, using the command line and vim, for about eight years now. It's only been in the past year that I started using Screen, and I feel stupid for not using it soo…

Screen is great. Though not it's fault, the only downside is that it cant persist through a machine restart.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#74
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is really true. Back then we were still using CVS, and I was writing a feature that I thought wasn't quite big enough to branch and remerge for, but turned out to be a bit more involved to get right than I'd thought. Now we're on Mercurial and life is better. Edit: A nice win with the Linode is that they back it up for me for $5 a month. Sure, there are solutions for the desktop too, but somehow I never got arou…

I would observe that with DVCS, if your hard drive crashes you can still lose several days of un pushed code, too. I recommend and use cron jobs to push and/or rysnc things around on a more frequent basis for my really important stuff.

Dropbox fixes this.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#75
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true, but I'd be sacrificing the silence, the portability and the battery life. And the hipster factor, I guess. 102x768 isn't for everyone, but in text-mode it's all the same. I've no idea how many hours I've spent on a huge high-res monitor staring at a relatively tiny terminal window surrounded by a pretty desktop picture.

The battery life of a Macbook Air is pretty damn good. You can get a good 6+ hours of work out of them before needing to plug in. Not quite iPad-scale, but close enough in many cases. Also, the iPad does tend to run out of battery a bit more quickly when using 3G and bluetooth heavily, I believe...

For me, 6 hours is the difference between needing to take a charger to work and never thinking about it. If I'm going to take a charger, I might as well have 1 hour battery life.

I didn't buy the 3G version, but I do use bluetooth for the keyboard all day and still get around 9 hours out of it.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#76
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm talking about the time between keystrokes and visual response. To make the switch-over even easier, rebind to C-a instead of the (sensible) tmux default of C-b. Put this into your ~/.tmux.conf: set -g prefix C-a unbind C-b bind C-a send-prefix bind-key C-a last-window

Neither are sensible for anyone who uses Emacs keybindings (at the shell or in Emacs). I have my prefix key set to C-t, which is tolerable.

Being an emacs user, C-a was never practical. I always set mine to ` (backtick). Except when writing shell scripts, it's surprising how little it actually comes up, and learning to type it twice when you actually want one is not hard. It reduces by 1/3rd the number of keys involved in switching "tabs" or doing other stuff.

Unlearning typing it twice for when you're not in screen is the hard part.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#77
There are a lot of comments here from people acting as if not having two 24" monitors and a full mechanical keyboard would drastically diminish their productivity. This year I spent 4 months out of the country with only my 15" laptop while still working 8 hour days. I was surprised to find no change at all in how long it took to get shit done. I think we tend to kid ourselves about how much of a difference expensive equipment makes.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#79
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I must confess, I did wonder about adding a second iPad for browsing documentation, or maybe one of the new kindles... I went through a phase of using multiple monitors all the time. After a year or so I came to the conclusion that alt-tab is quicker and easier than looking at another physical screen. Swiping isn't; I wish alt-tab worked in iOS. Still, it's close and it stops me checking my mail too often.

I think this is one of the places where Win8's tablet interface will gain fans. I've seen the developer preview and being able to snap windows to the side and get a "mini mode" (or whatever it's called) is really cool.

This. I'm sure a "mini mode" will be a part of every tablet interface in a couple of years' time.

Re: I swapped my MacBook for an iPad+Linode

#80
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is really true. Back then we were still using CVS, and I was writing a feature that I thought wasn't quite big enough to branch and remerge for, but turned out to be a bit more involved to get right than I'd thought. Now we're on Mercurial and life is better. Edit: A nice win with the Linode is that they back it up for me for $5 a month. Sure, there are solutions for the desktop too, but somehow I never got arou…

I would observe that with DVCS, if your hard drive crashes you can still lose several days of un pushed code, too. I recommend and use cron jobs to push and/or rysnc things around on a more frequent basis for my really important stuff.

Raid and rsync are your friends. Use them.
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