Well... maybe the title is a bit too much, but whenever I have to use a Mac without these programs installed I feel something is missing. Not really talking about working because that's another whole issue and it depends on the tasks at hand, I'm just referring to simply browsing, reading, or even watching someone else using another computer.

Paste

This is by far the number 1. Easy... copy everything you want to the clipboard and then whenever you want to paste just hit Cmd+Shift+V and everything is there. You can edit them before pasting and bookmark them, no need to go back and forth between different windows, and you can even search for old copies, never losing a reference again.

A clipboard manager is a MUST HAVE, even more so for programmers... we do some copy/pasting...

BetterTouchTool

I use this one to set up gestures to navigate between tabs(left and right), closing the current tab and opening a new one. I moved the 3-finger gestures to 4-finger ones and now I'm using 3-finger swipes on the browser, works like a charm. Up for a new tab, Down to close it, and left/right to move to another tab.

This is actually where I feel like I'm super slow when I'm not using my computer.

When I'm not programming I'm probably researching or reading something and moving between workspaces, windows or tabs feels like going to the supermarket in a foreign country.

iStat Menus

Not knowing what my computer is doing drives me crazy. I MUST have real-time information about network inbound/outbound, fan speed(CPU temp), and CPU usage at least. Sometimes a process runs wild or something hangs, I need to know what is happening!

With iStat Menus I can also check which program is downloading/uploading information and which ones are using the most CPU.

Bartender

I don't need to have all the icons sitting there all the time, they add a lot of noise to the screen. Just the system monitors, date/time, and new mail notifications. Then Bartender hides everything else. Now that Apple added the camera to the screen it reduced the real state for the tray icons, I like to keep it minimal and clean.

Yoink

This is my latest addition. I heard about Yoink a long time ago but never took the time to give it a try. Now I love it. "Drag and drop" without Yoink is a pain. I use it primarily for screenshots.

The concept is great, it creates a "staging" zone for everything you drag into it. Just drag whatever it is you want to copy/move and it will stay into Yoink's popup until you grab it from there later. Then after you focus on the window where you want to drop it just drag it from Yoink and that's it. It even does the trick for text selections. Pretty handful.

Bonus:

• SSH Proxy -> This is a gem. I'll dedicate a blog post later to this one
• Bitwarden -> Must have! but not macOS specific
• RayCast -> I'm not a power user so I can live with Spotlight
• iTerm2 -> If the terminal has Oh-My-Zsh it is good enough for me
• Fig -> Nice to have
• Keka -> Easily replaceable
• Airmail -> Just better than keeping a Gmail tab
• Cyberduck -> Well rounded, but there are many alternatives available
• Meeter -> I like the notifications