Last week, I had to take the laptop to the tech support and, when I got it back, the hard drive had been swept clean. No files, no apps, no anything. I knew that was a possibility and had done a backup of the most important files (but not all of them 😭).
Now, I had to get everything ready again. These are the steps I followed and the applications I installed. I will install more apps later, but these are the ones I needed to hit the road and start doing what I wanted.
If you have any recommendations for apps/plugins/extensions I should check out and install, drop them in the comments.
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Updated the OS and apps
This may take a while, but I prefer to do it first, just in case there's a compatibility issue with an app later.
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Cleared the taskbar
Too many default apps in the taskbar, plus I needed to make space for my apps.
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Installed browsers
I do web development, so I like testing with multiple browsers and tools.
- Brave
- Chrome
- Firefox
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...and browser extensions:
- WebAIM Wave
- Accessibility Insights for Web
- aXe: for accessibility testing
- Chromevox / ScreenReader
- Grammarly
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Installed development apps & tools
I installed different IDEs, although I plan on mostly using just one (Visual Studio Code). But, unfortunately, installing Android Studio/Xcode is the easiest way to get essential SDKs and tools for development. And I want to go back to developing for mobile... we'll see how that goes.
- Visual Studio Code + extensions
- Xcode + iOS 14 simulator
- Xcode Command Line Tools
- Android Studio
- NodeJS
- Git Desktop
- Cordova
- XAMPP
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Installing utils
This must be the first time I don't install Microsoft Office (I personally like that suite). So instead, I'll use Apple's default tools. Plus, adding some basic apps for photo and audio editions.
- GIMP
- Grammarly
- Audacity
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Communication tools
I'm not a big fan of Zoom (and have strong opinions about why it should not exist)... but people use it for meetings. Slack is a common open-source project communication tool, and WhatsApp is convenient to talk to my family and friends.
- Slack
- WhatsApp Desktop
- Zoom
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Updated the OS and apps (again)
After installing some of the tools, macOS realized that some of the apps were not updated and that the OS needed an update itself.
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Restored backed up files
Old projects into the new computer, plus personal files. Here I realized that some of the files hadn't backed up correctly and were lost forever. When you do a backup, double-check the files 😢
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Cleaned the desktop and emptied the Trash
After installing everything, there were a bunch of files in the Downloads and Desktop folders. So I deleted them and emptied the trash. The computer was then clean and ready.
Top comments (2)
One technique I've found useful is actually maintaining a repo for setting up new machines. I personally only benefit from it every few years or so, but on teams it's incredibly useful for automating the onboarding process!
Setup macOS for Development
Camilo Martinez ・ Sep 26 '18 ・ 9 min read