Useful Information Resources
www.height8.com/info/resources
Last update: Feb 19 2014 15:30 EDT
This is a periodically updated non-exhaustive list of links to resources (including hardware and software) over a variety of genres and interests. Listing here does not constitute endorsement nor warranty of fitness, but I have purchased and regularly use a number of the software packages mentioned below - some are indispensable. In many cases the items are multipurpose, so placing them in a single category is a bit arbitrary. Often there are advantages buying these applications directly from the developers rather than via the Mac App Store, in terms of features/sandboxing restrictions. Obvious applications (e.g. made by Apple itself) aren't listed.
Text & Code Editing
- Bare Bones BBEDIT for HTML, code and text editing [Mac App Store], @bbedit on Twitter
- Bare Bones TextWrangler "little brother" to BBEDIT, for those that only need a simpler & free editor [Mac App Store]
- Alexander Blach's Textastic HTML, code and text editor for Mac [Mac App Store], @Textastic on Twitter, also for iPad [iTunes Store] and iPhone [iTunes Store]
- The venerable SubEthaEdit for real-time simultaneous collaborative text editing
Writing
- Final Draft for scripts & screenplays, @finaldraftinc on Twitter, [Mac App Store], and their companion iOS apps [iTunes Store]
- Literature & Latte's Scrivener for novels, research papers & scripts, @scrivenerapp on Twitter, [Mac App Store]
- Literature & Latte's Scapple for mind-mapping & freeform text editing, [Mac App Store]
- Quote-Unquote's Highland to convert screenplays between PDF, FDX & Fountain format, @qapps on Twitter, [Mac App Store]
- LibreOffice for Word Processing, Spreadsheets & Presentations
- Matt Gemmell's Fiction Style Guide
Keyboards & Input Devices
- CODE keyboard available at WASD Keyboards
Desktop Automation & Productivity
- Smile Software's TextExpander, @SmileSoftware on Twitter, [Mac App Store], and their iOS version [iTunes Store]
- Running with Crayons Alfred, [Mac App Store] and the Powerpack
- George Brocklehurst's Choosy to open URLs in ad hoc browsers
- Unvetted: Sveinbjorn Thordarson's Platypus which creates application bundles from interpreted scripts, [GitHub]
- Matt Gemmell/instinctive code's Sticky Notifications, [Mac App Store]
- James Thomson's PCalc, @jamesthomson on Twitter, [Mac App Store] and the iOS version [iTunes Store]
Server Automation
- Ansible, [GitHub], @ansible on Twitter
- Puppet, @puppetlabs on Twitter
- Boxen for Puppet
- Chef, @getchefdotcom on Twitter
Continuous Integration
- Jenkins, @jenkinsci on Twitter
- JetBrains TeamCity, @jetbrains on Twitter
Server Monitoring
Security
- AgileBits 1Password Password Manager, @1Password on Twitter & App.net, [Mac App Store], and their iOS version [iTunes Store]
- AgileBits Knox Encrypted Vaults
- Cloak VPN service, @getcloak on Twitter
- Karl von Randow's Charles Proxy for HTTP proxy & monitor & Reverse Proxy to view all HTTP & SSL/HTTPS traffic including iOS
- Electric Sheep Fencing's pfSense Firewall, @pfsense on Twitter
- Unvetted: Objective Development's Little Snitch, @littlesnitch on Twitter, @mmasser on App.net
REPO / SOURCE CONTROL
- Atlassian's SourceTree for Git
- fournova Software's Tower Git client for Mac, @gittower on Twitter
Diff
- Black Pixel's Kaleidoscope, @kaleidoscopeapp on Twitter
Disassembly & Debugging
Fonts
- DZ's Inconsolata-dz, @dz on Twitter
- Adobe's Source Code Pro (GitHub) & Source Sans Pro (GitHub)
Graphics
- Shiny Development's Status Magic for adding perfect status bars to iOS App Store screenshots, [Mac App Store]
- The Iconfactory's xScope for on-screen measuring & testing, @xscopeapp on Twitter, [Mac App Store]
- Glyphish iOS icons, @glyphish on Twitter
Localization & Translation
- Peer Assembly's Linguan for localizing Mac & iOS apps, [Mac App Store]
- Applingua's LinguaSwitch to quickly launch Mac apps in any available language, [Mac App Store]
Beta Testing & Distribution
- HockeyApp service, and Mac app, along with HockeyCoach for crash report management, @hockeyapp on Twitter & App.net
Mobile Development Previewers
- Bjango's Skala Preview, @bjango on Twitter & App.net, [Mac App Store] and companion iOS app [iTunes Store]
- Avatron's Air Display, [Mac App Store] and companion iOS app [iTunes Store]
Languages & IDEs
- Xamarin Studio for C# native Mac/iOS/Android/Windows, @xamarinhq on Twitter
- JetBrains AppCode for Objective C, IntelliJ IDEA for Java, RubyMine for Ruby & Rails +web, PyCharm for Python +web, @jetbrains on Twitter
- ActiveState's Komodo IDE for Python, PHP, Ruby, Perl, HTML, CSS & JavaScript, and their Perl Dev Kit (PDK), or both as Pro Studio
- CoffeeScript, compiles to JavaScript
- LUA
Software Installers
- Qt Installer Framework Manual & gitorious Repo
- Flexera Software's InstallAnywhere & InstallShield
- Indigo Rose's Setup Factory & MSI Factory
- Nullsoft Scriptable Install System: NSIS
- Jordan Russell's Inno Setup (see also isskin for customizable skins, and InnoTools Downloader)
SSH/SFTP/FTP/VNC/RDP/Terminal
- VanDyke Software's SecureCRT OS X Terminal, SSH, Telnet, Serial
- VanDyke Software's SecureFX SFTP, SCP, FTP over SSL, & FTP
- Panic's Transmit FTP, SFTP, Amazon S3, WebDAV, [Mac App Store]
- Panic's Prompt SSH & Telnet for iOS, [iTunes Store]
- AppHug's Serial Tools Terminal Emulator, Protocol Analyzer & serial port monitor, [Mac App Store]
- Houdah Software's Type2Phone Virtual Bluetooth Keyboard, [Mac App Store]
- Secret Geometry's Cathode Vintage Terminal, [Mac App Store]
- Microsoft's Remote Desktop, RDP, [Mac App Store]
- Apple's Remote Desktop, [Mac App Store]
Backup & Sync
- Shirt Pocket's SuperDuper!
- Bombich Software's Carbon Copy Cloner, @bombichsoftware on Twitter
- bcpierce's Unison File Synchronizer
Dashboard
- Panic's Status Board, [iTunes Store]
- Sal Conigliaro's Apple Service Status (GitHub) for Panic's Status Board
- Status Board Widgets for Panic's Status Board
- Etosi's Telemetry Data Visualization, [iTunes Store], [Mac App Store], @telemetryapp on Twitter
- Unvetted: Leftronic, @LeftronicCo on Twitter
Database
- MySQL Workbench
- Thermal Core's Core Data Editor, [Mac App Store], @CocoaPimper on Twitter, @kienle on App.net
Cloud
- Amazon Web Services (AWS)
- Microsoft Windows Azure, @windowsazure on Twitter
- OpenStack Cloud Software, Open source software for building private and public clouds
Hosting, Colocation & Domain Registration
- Mac Mini Colocation & Mac Pro Colocation, @macminicolo on Twitter
- pair Networks for Shared, VPS & Dedicated hosting
- pairNIC for Domain Name Registration
Customer Support / Ticketing / Tracking
- zendesk Help Desk, @zendesk on Twitter
- FogBugz Bug Tracking, @FogCreek on Twitter
- JetBrains YouTRACK Agile Issue Tracking & Project Tracking Tool, @jetbrains on Twitter
Communication, Instant Messaging, Collaboration
- Colloquy IRC client for Mac & iOS, [iTunes Store]
- Matt Wright's (unmaintained) MacIrssi IRC client (GitHub), @daagaak on Twitter
- Irssi text/terminal IRC client
Web/HTML IDE & Dev
- Realmac Software's RapidWeaver, @realmacsoftware on Twitter, [Mac App Store]
- Panic's Coda, @Panic on Twitter, [Mac App Store], and their iOS version [iTunes Store]
- Mike Mattozzi's Cocoa Rest Client (GitHub) for testing HTTP endpoints
- JetBrains PhpStorm for PHP +web, WebStorm JavaScript IDE +web, @jetbrains on Twitter
Virtualization
- VMware's VMware Fusion Pro
Mapping
Audio
- XLD lossless audio decoder & ripper
- Rogue Amoeba's Audio Hijack Pro to record any audio
- Unsupported unmaintained The Levelator (which resolves to The Levelator on web.archive.org) which adjusts the audio levels within a podcast or other audio file for variations from one speaker to the next, @levelator on Twitter
- Audiobus to bring iOS audio apps together, @AudiobusApp on Twitter
Video
- VideoLAN's VLC Media Player
Email Clients, Servers & Tools
- Mozilla's Thunderbird email client
- University of Washington's Alpine text-based email client
- Dovecot Secure IMAP server
- Rick Sanders's IMAP Tools Perl scripts for sale
VoIP
- twilio for developer app integration, @twilio on Twitter
- les.net VoIP service from Canadian provider
Web Browsers
Operating Systems
- Canonical's Ubuntu, and Ubuntu Server
Funding
- Kickstarter, @kickstarter on Twitter
- indiegogo, @Indiegogo on Twitter
Point of Sale (POS) / EFTPOS / Merchant / ecommerce / Storefront
Game Dev Engines & Frameworks
- Unity Technologies Unity, @unity3d on Twitter, and Unity Asset Store, @unityassetstore on Twitter
- Epic Games Unreal Engine
- Crytek's CryENGINE
- BitSquid's BitSquid Engine
- cocos2d-iphone framework for 2D games using Objective-C, for iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad, OSX and Android, @cocos2d on Twitter
Game Dev Audio
Game Dev Graphics & Visuals
- Rad Game Tools Bink 2
- Donya Labs Simplygon, @simplygon on Twitter
- Allegorithmic Substance Designer, @Allegorithmic on Twitter
- Umbra Software Umbra 3, @umbrasoftware on Twitter
- Silicon Studio Yebis 2
- Geomerics Enlighten, @Geomerics on Twitter
Game Dev modeling, sculpting & rendering
- Autodesk's Maya, @Autodesk_ME on Twitter
- Blender
- Pixologic's ZBrush, @pixologic on Twitter
Game Dev Physics, Animation & A.I.
- Havok
- Ikinema Runtime, @ikinema on Twitter
- Autodesk's Gameware, @ADSKGameware on Twitter
- NaturalMotion's Morpheme & Euphoria, @NMGames on Twitter
- Nvidia's PhysX & APEX
- xaitment's XaitControl, @xaitTicker on Twitter
Game Dev Controllers
- tattiebogle OS X Xbox 360 Controller USB driver
- Unity InputManager mappings for Xbox 360 Controller
- Patrick Hogan's InControl [Unity Asset Store], [GitHub] cross-platform multi controller InputManager for Unity, @pbhogan on Twitter
Game Emulation
- OpenEmu, @openemu on Twitter
- MAME & MESS
- The Internet Archive Software Collection MESS and MAME, and Collection Search results
- Ultimarc Game Controls hardware
- Virtual Apple ][, @virtualapple on Twitter
Electronics / Hardware
- Toronto's HackLab.TO, @hacklabto on Twitter
- SD/SDHC Speed Class information
- Unvetted: Mixshop Toronto for RepRap & parts
Licensing, Trademarks, Copyright
- World Intellectual Property Organization
- Choose A License (OSS)
- Creative Commons, @creativecommons on Twitter
Books & reference materials
- The Pragmatic Programmers The Pragmatic Bookshelf
- Jesse Freeman's Weekend Code Project: Unity's New 2D Workflow
- Marmoset's Basic Theory of Physically-Based Rendering
Videos & Slides
- GDC Vault in-depth design, technical and inspirational talks & slides from the influencers of the game development industry
- Steam Dev Days (YouTube) Steamworks Development
Tea
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