Mike Stone

Mostly The Lonely Howls Of Mike Baying His Ideological Purity At The Moon

Work Applications

04 Dec 2024

Like many people who use Linux on their home computer, my personal preference don’t get taken into consideration at work. Unfortunately, as far as my work laptop is concerned, I’m a Windows 11 user. So, just for fun I thought I’d do a brief inventory of the applications I use to get my work done on a day to day basis.

So, here’s the “list”. What have we got here that we’re using day to day?

  1. The one I use the absolute most. Windows Terminal. Despite the fact that I’m required to use Windows, most of my time is spent here remoted into a Linux server somewhere else. I use WSL so I’ve got at least a version of Linux at my fingertips, even when I’m using Windows, and then I’m SSHed out to another system. I’d wager 90% of my time is spent here.

  2. File Explorer. Fairly self explanitory. This one probably doesn’t deserve the placement on the task bar. I use it, but not often. Usually just to remove files some process has downloaded and I don’t need. I organize my OneDrive with this too.

  3. Outlook. The default mail application for our company. Lots of people’s companies. It is what it is.

  4. Vivaldi. I use it at home. I use it at work. I use it on my phone and my laptop and everywhere. It’s my browser of choice, period. Full stop.

  5. Zen Browser. I like this browser, and if I need something else other than Vivaldi, I’ve been using Zen lately. This is most often when I want two different sessions for the same page.

  6. Last but not least, DBeaver. This one I use probably as much as the File Explorer, but it’s honestly more important. If I’ve got to be digging around in one of our databases, this is where I go. File Explore I sometimes just fire up the Windows Terminal and deal with my files that way, so the File Explorer I don’t really need. DBeaver I don’t have any backups for. There are other solutions out there, but this one is the one that’s filled this niche for me.

So, out of this list, what doesn’t work in Linux? Very little honestly. Outlook could be argued, but it’s Office 365, which has a web version. I’m not using any advanced features or anything. Email and calendar. Easy to do the same thing through the web interface. File Explorer? It’s not even as nice as Nautilus on Zorin, so big nope there. Obviously I’d be just as happy to use a terminal on Linux as I am to use Windows Terminal. Vivaldi, Zen, and DBeaver all have Linux versions and can be installed realitively painlessly.

No, there’s no good reason for me to be using Windows at work. Maybe, someday, they’ll take my request into consideration and let me use something I’m happier with.

Day 30 of the #100DaysToOffload Series.


Looking for comments? There are no comments. It's not that I don't care what you think, it's just that I don't want to manage a comments section.

If you want to comment, there's a really good chance I at least mentioned this post on Fosstodon, and you can reply to me there. If you don't have a Mastodon account, I'd suggest giving it a try.

If you don't want to join Mastodon, and you still want to comment, feel free to use my contact information.

Also, don't feel obligated, but if you feel like buying me a ☕ cup of coffee ☕ I won't say no.