Digging Into The Developer Toolbox (Work Smarter, Not Harder)

  • Apr 9, 2014
  • Jim Priest

Speaker:  Jim Priest
April 9, 2014

Every developer has their basic tools - a robust IDE, source control and a good bug tracker.

But what else is in your toolbox? In this presentation I'll explore some additional tools and techniques that can increase your productivity and allow you to concentrate on developing great applications.  At the end of this session you'll type less, be more comfortable with the command line and thinking about how you can work smarter with your new tools.  For this presentation I will be using Linux and Windows but the concepts are platform agnostic! This presentation is about the hammers and screwdrivers in your toolbox. We don't care if they are Craftsman hammers or Stanley screwdrivers.?

Target Audience
Anyone who wants to work smarter, type less and be more efficient in their day to day activities.

Assumed Knowledge
You know about the command line (you don't need to be an expert!) and can edit simple scripts.

You will learn about

  • Keyboard launchers - clean up that messy desktop and stop hunting for icons.
  • Grunt - the new Ant. Quick overview of what it can do.
  • Don't fear the command line: Git, grep/awk/sed and wget/curl.
  • Speaking of Git, we will explore the git config file and some useful bash shortcuts. Do you really want to type 'git status' for the rest of your life?
  • Speaking of the command line, we will explore improving the Windows command line with ConEmu, GOW, and TCC/LE.
  • Clipboard managers - quit typing the same things over and over. A clipboard manager can keep a long running history of what you type so you don't have to.
  • Text replacers - type less! Let these tools type repetitive, long or complex things for you!

All of the tools I'll be demonstrating are free, most are open-source and all have similar equivalents available on all three platforms: Windows, Mac and Linux. I will be providing a list of resources for all platforms in my presentation handout which will be available online after my presentation.

Presentation Links

Jim Priest

Jim PriestJim Priest is a husband, father of two, developer, and avid motorcyclist.

He has extensive experience working as a developer and has also been a system administrator managing web, database and email servers as well as configuration manager responsible for trouble ticket systems, version control and automated deployments.

Jim is an active participant in the ColdFusion community; co-managing the Triangle Area ColdFusion User Group (TACFUG) in the Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina area. In 2009 he helped organize CFinNC, the first ColdFusion conference in North Carolina, which has since turned into NCDevCon, a general web and mobile developers conference. 

 In his spare time he enjoys tinkering with Linux and flying remote control airplanes. 

 He posts regularly to his blog at http://www.thecrumb.com.