Keeping track of all your projects' build systems

I work on a lot of different coding projects. Websites, front end and back, Mac and iOS coding, Ruby gems, scripting, design projects. While I'm working on a project, the build, deploy, and other | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for March 29, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Backblaze Cloud Backup –the easiest way to back up all your data

Thanks to Backblaze for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week. I've been a user of both the Backblaze cloud backup and their B2 storage service for years, and it's the best solution I've found for | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

When you find a hair clipper worth writing about...

Just to be clear, this post is about a hair clipper called the Shortcut Pro. This is not about Shortcuts for iOS or any kind of automation. It's about a hair clipper. You have permission to feel | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Macstock 2019 is on the horizon

Hey, guess what? I'm speaking at Macstock 2019 (and yes, see the end of the post for my special discount code!). It's coming up on July 27th and 28th this year, once again in Woodstock, IL. Which you | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for March 22, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Working Smarter with MeisterTask

Thanks to MeisterTask for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week. I've been using MeisterTask extensively—including integration with Slack and GitHub—for collaborative projects for quite a while | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Finally, new columns for iTextEditors

I posted an update on iTextEditors yesterday, and got a great response from people adding to and updating the list. This inspired me to finally add a couple of new criteria (that didn't even exist | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The dwindling number of iOS text editors

Over the weekend I weeded out the dead apps on my iTextEditors comparison chart and was surprised to find that over 30 of the 90 editors on the list were no longer available. I figured a few would be | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

TextExpander's new Visual Editor

Thanks to TextExpander for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week! | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Get better stats for your writing with Marked 2

I've put together a new screencast demonstrating some of the document statistics capabilities of Marked 2. In addition to being a great way to preview your Markdown documents as you work, Marked can | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The ultimate guide to DuckDuckGo

Disclosure: DuckDuckGo has sponsored this site in the past. This post is not paid for (or even authorized by) DuckDuckGo. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Amazon affiliates and automated contextual snippets in Jekyll

Whenever I link to an Amazon product on this blog, I use an affiliate link through the Amazon Affiliate program. They pay me a nominal amount for the referral and it doesn't cost my users anything. I | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Your security and privacy: next steps

As I mentioned previously, I'm working to make this site as respectful of privacy as it can possibly be. To that end, it was pointed out to me by a reader (thanks @maclm) that the comment system I've | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Marked 2.5.31

Marked 2.5.31 is available via automatic update, the Mac App Store, and Setapp. It's all fixes this time around, but I took care of a bunch of little buggers. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for February 26, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Your security and privacy

I've made a few changes to my sites to be more in line with my own thoughts on privacy and security. When I'm using the internet, I use ad blockers, a VPN, and secure DNS on all of my devices, yet I' | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions: DIY Photo Edition

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Work efficiently with TextExpander

Happy Valentine's Day, and a big thanks to TextExpander for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week! | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

On blogging, ethics, and thin skin

I've written for a variety of publications over my career. TUAW, Macworld, MacStories, and Lifehacker, to name a few. The vast majority of my writing happens right here in my own little world, though. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for February 12, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Hook: connect everything

I'm really excited about Hook, the latest app from Luc Beaudoin (creator of MySleepButton). It makes it possible to link together documents, photos, notes, todo items, web pages and more. Instant | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Brainstorming: how I start a project

I have piles of mind maps for ideas I've never started working on, probably never will, and that doesn't bother me at all. I enjoy the process, and I love having the trove of inspiration. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Retrobatch: node-based image processing

I mentioned Retrobatch a while back when it first went into public beta. After using it for a while now, I wanted to let you know that it's worth grabbing and getting into. I'm pretty sure that if | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The addictive hobby of customizing mechanical keyboards

Since that one time that I wrote a review of the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard for you nerds, I've only come to love my UHK more. I'm officially a mechanical keyboard guy at this point. Much like the | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The addictive hobby of customizing mechanical keyboards

Since that one time that I wrote a review of the Ultimate Hacking Keyboard for you nerds, I've only come to love my UHK more. I'm officially a mechanical keyboard guy at this point. Much like the | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Brainstorming: how I start a project

I have piles of mind maps for ideas I've never started working on, probably never will, and that doesn't bother me at all. I enjoy the process, and I love having the trove of inspiration. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for January 30, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Save time with Chrome custom search engines

While Firefox has made very impressive strides, I still use Chrome as my primary browser. It's due in no small part to the Workona extension, but that's beside the point of this post. I wanted to | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for January 22, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

You won't believe what Marked 2 will do to its status bar and 11 bugfixes that will clickbait SEO headline

Oh good, that headline worked as planned. I used an odd number as recommended by clickbait experts, and you clicked. The system works. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Stuff I've made (and actually use)

Out of the 100+ projects I’ve published over the years, here are some that (still) make it into daily usage. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for January 14, 2019

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

PDFpen: Get the ultimate tool for editing PDFs

Thanks to PDFpen for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week! | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Brett's Favorites 2018

Welcome to another year of my "best of" lists. I'm throwing it all into one post this year, so the list is a little shorter than years past. I have my reasons. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Twenty Nineteen

It's harder than you might think to find a date-based stock photo with a tone anything less than "jubilant excitement." All I wanted was 2019 in a shade of "cautious optimism," but no. It's all | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Get the most from your PDFs with PDFpen

Thanks to PDFpen for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week! | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for December 06, 2018

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Creativity and Distraction

Some of you may recall a publication created by Aaron Mahnke (now better known for Lore) called Read & Trust. It was a zine-style collection of works by a group of trusted bloggers. I was flattered | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Lucky Charms, a light color scheme for Sublime Text

I've always used dark color schemes for coding. I never use dark themes for writing, and I'm not a fan of Dark Mode in Mojave, but for some reason I've always gravitated to light-on-dark for coding. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The Future of the TabLinks Safari Extension

A long time ago I wrote an extension for Safari called TabLinks. It simply generated Markdown lists of links to all the currently opened tabs. It's been updated a few times over the years, but recent | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

PDFpen and PDFpenPro, the ultimate tools for PDF editing

Thanks to PDFpen for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week! | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Shell Tricks: instant wildcard directory search

Here's a handy trick I use at the command line to quickly find filenames matching simple wildcard patterns in nested folders. It's called lsgrep because that's essentially what it does: grep a list | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for November 06, 2018

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The Marked 2 NaNoShaNoWriMo Sale

It's No-Shave November and National Novel Writing Month. I figured as long as we're letting our body hair grow while toiling over literary masterpieces, I should probably make sure everyone has the | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

The future of the TabLinks Safari Extension

A long time ago I wrote an extension for Safari called TabLinks. It simply generated Markdown lists of links to all the currently opened tabs. It's been updated a few times over the years, but recent | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Web Excursions for November 01, 2018

An irregularly-scheduled roundup of Brett’s favorite web discoveries. | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago

Cammeleon: privacy made simple

Thanks to Cammeleon for sponsoring BrettTerpstra.com this week! | Continue reading


@brettterpstra.com | 5 years ago