I have been running a homegrown NAS with Ubuntu for a couple of years now. It basically serves as filestorage for media, including photos taken over a number of years. Previously, I had a Synology Diskstation, but I was lacking some of the flexibility in running a fullfledged server - I wanted more control over my storage and backups.

Up until now, I've been running everything manually, by installing packages, running scripts etc., but it seemed to me I lost a lot of historical data that way. If I at one point have to reinstall my NAS, I'd have to go through all the motions again, reading up on installations of NFS, SnapRaid etc.

So, I decided to try out an automated solution, documenting my setup in the process.

Picking the right tool for the job

There's a bunch of configuration management tools outthere, as the field has grown over the last years, making it a lot harder to pick one without doing some detailed research.

Thankfully, there's a lot of material on the subject, like Ansible vs. Chef and even this one, covering even more.

Personally, I've had my hands on Chef and Puppet over the years, but at certain points they both seem cumbersome to me - at least for small-scale projects like the one I wanted to try it out on.

About Ansible

Ansible is an automation engine, written in Python and YAML, used for automating configuration management and deployment. Instead of having a client/server setup like Puppet for instance, it relies solely on a client (in this case that would be my Mac) and an SSH connection to the server you want to setup, making it a perfect suit for smaller, simpler setups like a personal NAS etc.

The syntax seems very simple to me, using YAML makes most playbooks very readable and the commands easily understandable.

In general, there's a lot of easily accessible playbooks for most things (Just try searching on GitHub for Ansible), like setting up NFS, running Apache etc., so Ansible is very easy to get started on, especially if you've tinkered with configuration files previously.

Getting started on the setup

I've personally stolen a few things from Alex - or more specifically, his serversetup, as he had some configurations for handling SnapRaid etc.

As I already have a server running, I'll be introducing Ansible all over, one service at a time - eventually transforming all the manual setups into Ansible ones. I haven't yet found a service that could magically transform an existing setup into an Ansible one (not properly, at least) - but again, that would probably have kept me from actually learning the proper syntax.

You can follow the work on my Ansible playbook for my NAS while I'm building it on GitHub

As you may recall, I used Karabiner and Seil to remap my Caps Lock previously, allowing me to use it for Alfred or OmniFocus.

However, Karabiner no longer works in macOS Sierra and the alternative Karabiner-Elements has yet to support multiple keystrokes for a single key.

My muscle memory caused some issues on this after upgrading to macOS Sierra, as I've grown kinda used to using Caps Lock for OmniFocus, suddenly requiring me to skip that habit.

Karabiner-Elements?

Karabiner-Elements is a new set of sub commands from the original Karabiner, for now basically a scaffold for the next version of Karabiner.

Even though it doesn't (yet!) support firing multiple keystrokes on a single key, Karabiner-Elements is not all bad, as it allows for rebinding Caps Lock to some F-keys not usually used on the Mac keyboard (Specifically F13-20), which will allow for remapping Caps Lock to fire something which you wouldn't normally use.

After installing Karabiner-Elements, open it up and setup the following:

This gets us part of the way, but not quite. We still need to trigger something on pressing the F18 button.

Hammerspoon to the rescue

I recently discovered Hammerspoon, as it's popped up a few places as being the next big thing for automation geeks on macOS.

Hammerspoon is basically a software-bridge between the lower levels of macOS (using the Accessibility API in macOS) and a Lua scripting engine. This means you can monitor and automate behavior, based on things like WiFi available, screens connected etc. However, it also allows you to do systemwide shortcuts, which is what we'll use here.

In this case, we want to remap F18 into firing a combination of the Option key (alt) and Space, effectively doing what Karabiner-Elements currently cannot.

I won't go into the details on installing Hammerspoon here, they have a pretty decent introduction on the site. Once it's installed, Hammerspoon looks for init.lua in the .hammerspoon directory in your home directory, to determine the rules and shortcurts you've set up. To avoid confusion, I won't include all of my init.lua here, but this is basically what you would need to include, in order to allow F18 to fire alt + space. The reason for the additional check on other keys, is to allow for using Caps Lock as an additional modifier key, allowing for more bindings using it, if needed:

-- Enter Hyper Mode when F18 (Caps Lock) is pressed
pressedF18 = function()
  k.triggered = false
  k:enter()
end

-- Leave Hyper Mode when F18 (Caps Lock) is released,
--   fire alt + space if no other keys are pressed.
releasedF18 = function()
  k:exit()
  if not k.triggered then
    hs.eventtap.keyStroke({"alt"}, 'SPACE')
  end
end

-- Bind the Hyper key
f18 = hs.hotkey.bind({}, 'F18', pressedF18, releasedF18)

Once you have the code in your init.lua, reload Hammerspoon (If it's not set to do that automatically), and you're good to go, Caps Lock should now fire alt + space!

Good luck on hacking your keyboard in macOS Sierra - I guarantee that Hammerspoon will be a rabbithole, if you're into automation ;)

Usually, once every year (around New Years) I do spring cleaning of my GTD setup. Normally, this includes a complete rundown of all my GTD activities to eliminate any dead projects as well as clearing my head of any new ideas, getting them into my flow.

However, this year, New Years came early. Over the course of the last year, I've been having different issues with my workflow, my projects and my contexts, leaving me with a partially broken GTD flow - but more on that in a later post.

Suffering from "overanalysis"

During the last few months, it's become clear to me that I've spent too much time on categorizing my projects, fitting them into very specific boxes, instead of acting on the steps needed to complete them. I tend to attribute this to my work as a developer, as I'm used to taking apart problems into tiny pieces, and to constantly optimize on how I solve things. Usually, this is a good thing, but when it comes to GTD, you might end up in a rabbithole of trying to optimize your setup.

Evolving to handle new roles

One of the other things I need to address, is that life changes. What worked for me a few years ago, will no longer work. Things have changed, I now have a lengthy commute to work every day, I have different priorities as a developer, as a coworker, as a familyman. All of these play into what's coming up in my new workflow over the next weeks.

TL;DR: I basically just removed every single project and every single context in OmniFocus. Will rethink my entire GTD flow, as it no longer fits my needs.

In 2014, I'm switching jobs. In the course of this decision, I was asked by a former colleague, what motivated me in a position, as I've had quite a few over the years. Here's my top 5 list, starting by debunking a pretty big myth.

Money isn't everything

One of the most common misunderstandings of developers I've met over the years, is that we are in an industry that pays high salaries, and that's the reason for us being in the game. Furthermore, I've met a lot of middle-managers, who think developers are overpaid and spoiled "nerds" with no life.

During my years as a developer, I've met 5% that work as developers for the money, and 100% of those were poor developers, with basic skills and no professional integrity. The reason is, basically, that learning development purely for the money is a bad investment. Most developers with a high skillset will have invested years of sparetime into learning and perfecting their craft, years with little or no pay for the most part.

But then, what motivates developers?

1. Success and "winning" spirit

Most developers are competitive, proud people, who try to deliver the best possible result.

Feeling like a part of a team, with a clear, common goal is probably the most motivating thing for any developer. Convince them that everyone is determined on reaching the same goals, and show them what their role is in the big picture, and most of the time, they will be the ones working like crazy, while others complain about late hours.

On the other hand - being forced into writing poor, unmaintainable code, is one of the worst things you can do to a developer who loves his craft. You wouldn't ask a construction worker to build your house using the worst possible materials, while being blindfolded.

If you have limited time, cut down on features, not on "doing things the right way". Delivering a successful product in a developers mind is more than just "launching on time" - if the technical platform is not up to the standards of the developer, they will see it as a failure, on time or not.

2. Making a difference

Developers are commonly fueled by the desire to change the world. Sometimes by automating stupid, human behaviour that waste precious lives, but most commonly by the desire to make everyones lives a bit easier and pleasant.

Most of the time, a developer will choose a position based on the reach of his work: If it affects millions of people, or helps someone, they will choose it over a position that pays a bit more. At the end of the day, developers are pleasers and problemsolvers.

3. Excellent management

No micro-management. The best way to manage a team of software developers, is to present a challenge, encourage independent thinking and shield the team from any disturbances, while not getting in the way of the development process.

The worst mistake made as a manager, is probably to demean the work done by developers. Don't tell them their estimates are "way off", unless you're a developer yourself, and know how a feature should be implemented. Instead, encourage them by explaining the impact of the feature, and the difference it will make for the company, not telling them it "should be easy to implement".

4. Being heard

Developers are on the frontline, when it comes to the services and systems running the company - and they're usually the first to know when something is not working. If a system crashes after a developer pointed out the flaws or shortcomings of the platform, over a period of time, he will take it personally if noone listened to the warnings.

The most basic rule - if a developer speaks, you should listen. If more developers agree, you should act.

5. Learning and being challenged

Chances are if you're hiring a developer that have 10 years of professional experience, you can count on them having at least 2-3 additional years of sparetime invested in their knowledge, and they did that for a reason.

As developers, the world we work in keep changing. Developers need to stay up-to-date, and most will do that on their own, if the challenges of the job require it. Just don't expect a developer to stay in a position, if the tasks are the same as they were last year.

Now what?

Are you a developer? Take a look at the list, and try to figure out which points are present in your current job, and which aren't. From my own world, points #1, #2 and #5 are some of the main reasons I'm looking forward to my new job. Are you pleased with your own result?

Are you a manager? Try asking the developers how they feel about the points in this post. Are they satisfied with all points, or are some lacking?

Update: PCKeyBoardHack and KeyRemap4MacBook are now called Seil and Karabiner - the screenshots still reflect the old names though.

Let's face it. Caps Lock is useless. Unless you're in the habit of writing all-caps e-mails, you'll probably only use Caps Lock when hitting it by accident.

For the last couple of years, I've made a habit out of disabling my Caps Lock, or changing it to do something better. The key itself is useful, its size make it easy to hit, and it's easily accessible.

What you'll need

On the Mac, there's a few handy apps that allow you to modify your key layout.

Seil

Seil allows you to change the keycode your keys are firing. This will be useful later on. To do so, either follow the simple guide on the website or do the following:

1. Download and install Seil
2. Start up the application
3. Enable "Change Caps Lock" as shown below, and set it to keycode 110. Keycode 110 is called PC application key on a PC keyboard, but is not used on a Mac. So, for now your Caps Lock key does nothing. So far so good.

Also, Mac OS per default limits the responsiveness of Caps Lock. Which is nice, as it hinders a lot of accidental Caps Lock use, but if we want to actually use Caps Lock for somthing, we need to make it faster. This is done by entering System Preferences -> "Keyboard" -> "Modifier Keys", and setting Caps Lock to "No Action" as shown below.

Mapping the key with Karabiner

Next up, we want the key to do something else. As you remember, I remapped it to PC Application Key, but I really want it to fire a key combination, like Option + Space (Which, in my example is what I use for OmniFocus - Per default this key combination triggers Spotlight).

So, onto the scene comes Karabiner, which allows for keycodes like PC Application Key, to fire a key combination. To map the PC Application Key (i.e. Caps Lock) to fire Option + Space, do the following:

1. Download and install Karabiner.
2. Start it up
3. You'll notice a looong list of keys to remap. However, you can search this list as shown below, and only show the mapping options for PC Application Key for instance.
4. As you'll notice below, it's possible to map the key to a lot of different options, for instance "Application Key to Option_L+Space", which in this case fires - Yep, you guessed it: Option + Space.

When this is done, your Caps Lock should now fire the wanted key combination, and you can use Caps Lock for something useful, like triggering Quick Entry in OmniFocus, triggering Alfred etc.

E-mail sucks (the life out of everyone).

About a year ago (in December 2011), Atos announced they were going to kill off any internal e-mail. Back then, people were pretty fast to think Atos were crazy, and that this was the worst possible idea ever. However, I'm starting to believe that they may be on to something, and here's why.

What's wrong with e-mail ?

1. It's inefficient, and slow.
2. It's a massive waste of time. Time is spent on formulating the correct response, rather than on acting.
3. You can't trust the urgency of e-mail
4. The younger generation currently being educated, sees e-mail as "old-fashioned" or "rigid"
5. It's the wrong way of handling a conflict. I've seen much harsher replies in e-mails than when the same people actually talk face-to-face.
6. People use it for storing information they "may need later".

How does e-mail waste time ?

Atlassian (Creators of collaborational software like Jira), have a neat infographic on the waste of time occuring in everyday professional life.

One of the major time wasters in e-mail communication, is the time spent "watching" e-mail. Most people will spend minutes or hours during the day, watching for new e-mail to avoid "missing" anything important, and as most e-mail accounts are filled with a mish-mash of important/important-later-but-not-now/useless information, it's clear to see why this fear exists in most people.

Furthermore, the rise of instant messaging, Facebook and texting (SMS), has made most people impatient when it comes to e-mail. Handling it as quickly as possible, deferring any tasks possible to someone else (by mail of course), and demanding responsetimes like on instant messaging, makes e-mail reading and processing a stressful task.

As an example, when I look at my inbox at work, the content can be broken down like this:

• One third is relevant, and contains information I need to do my job.
• One third are questions or clarification issues, that could easily be gathered, and sent once during the day, or handled more efficiently using another approach, like Skype or face-to-face.
• One third is pure noise, that doesn't belong in e-mail. Information about parties, rules for using the kitchen, funny links etc.

At home, my inbox is even worse, due to the amounts of newsletters I get, notifications from Github, Twitter etc.

So should we just start texting each other on our phones ?

No. But we should all get better at using the messaging protocols we have at our disposal. Instead of writing long, intricate e-mails, try keeping to shorter points and questions, suitable for simpler, faster communication forms (Like instant messaging).

Also, if there's a point to be made, that could be misinterpreted by a long e-mail, direct contact is by far a better approach.

A few steps to cut down on e-mail use

These are some of the changes I'm currently implementing, to limit my e-mail use:

Daily - Limit consumption of e-mail to 2-3 times daily. Preferably, only open e-mail in the morning and just after lunch.

Daily - Start out by responding to mails (Especially internal, corporate mails), on other media or face-to-face. Clarification takes way less time that way, and you have a better understanding of the other person's purpose.

Daily - If receiving important information, that you need further down the line, consider moving it to other systems asap. Account information like usernames and passwords are better stored elsewhere, documents should be stored somewhere with proper backup.

Weekly - Check up on any newsletters still appearing in your mail, ask yourself the following:

• Do they have a newsfeed, that would allow you to import / read all news in one place, when you want, instead of having them crammed down your inbox ?
• If not, is it still valuable enough to keep ?

A more radical approach

Setup an autoreply to all e-mail, explaining that you no longer accept e-mail, listing alternate ways of reaching you.

This is what my autoreply would look like:

Hi there!

I've received your e-mail, but I may not read it, as I'm trying to cut down on the time i spend on e-mail.

If you want to reach me, with possibly quicker responses, here's a few options you are able to use:

1. Skype - My account is jesperrasmussen.com
2. Twitter - jesperrasmussen
3. Facebook - http://facebook.com/jesperrasmussencom
4. LinkedIn - http://www.linkedin.com/in/wearedevelopers
5. SMS - If you get here, you probably know my number.

Have a great day!
Jesper

You may experience slight discomfort as you step out of the e-mail addiction, but should pass quickly. Afterwards, enjoy your freedom, and take joy in the fact that you've reclaimed your precious time and energy from the claws of e-mail!

This is actually a small rewrite of a blog post I did a few years ago, but as I didn't move this post to my new setup before now, and people still ask me questions about the subject, I wanted to refurbish, and republish the post.

I've been on the GTD (Getting Things Done) wagon for a couple of years, and as part of it, a lot of people ask the obvious question: What is it, and what's the point ?

Let's start at the beginning: Getting Things Done is a way of improving productivity. It's a way of organizing your life, it's a way of optimizing your day-to-day life and it's a way to combat stress. This might sound like just yet another scheme to steal money, but it's not really. The only thing you have to invest in, is the book, and from there on, the implementation of GTD in you life depends on what you make of it. Some people implement it using pen and paper, some have advanced software solutions for handling GTD, but the approach is entirely up to you.

GTD has had quite a lot of success during the last couple of years, and is in general very popular among especially developers, as it has a very structured approach to personal/project-management, and life in general.

The concepts of GTD

The primary concept of GTD, handles the way we perceive tasks. Usually, a lot of people have things written down on post-its, taking the tasks one by one in no particular order. Usually this means a lot of clutter, or "stuff" as it's called in GTD.

GTD puts focus on a couple of things to remove stuff, both from our desks and our consciousness, by splitting every project into atomic "bits" representing every single, physical action required for the project to be completed.

The Inbox

The inbox is the source of organizing. Everything goes inhere, just like a mail inbox. The inbox is where you write everything down, ideas, notes, todos, projects etc. The inbox is sorted regularly, taking care of smaller tasks right away, while larger projects are split into single, physical actions described later in this post.

An important note about the inbox, is that a large part of GTD is having the discipline to clean this up, or review it. This is for a lot of people handled on a daily basis, and a more advanced weekly or monthly basis. This is also the largest weak spot of GTD, as it requires a steady discipline to maintain the order of organizing everything regularly, and avoid having a large inbox.

Actions

Actions are the atomic bits and pieces of GTD. Actions define every physical action you have to take to complete the project at hand. Actions make up projects, and inorder to finish a project, one must complete every action within. This might look like this:

• Call Susan regarding budget for next year
• Implement integration service for Client X
• E-mail John from IT about server specs. for new production environment

Contexts

Contexts are defined by the surroundings you are currently in. This is a way of organizing actions that can only be fixed while being "at the computer", "at the office" or "on the phone". Context are used to group all actions, based on location or the tools at hand, and provides you with a simple list of "Things you're able to do right now". This means a context might hold 10 actions for 4 different projects, meaning you'll be able to focus on what's actually achievable from your current location, with the current tools at hand.

More reading

As this is only a very brief introduction into the world of GTD, I would recommend reading more about GTD, and some general concepts of increasing productivity without adding stress. Here's a few of my favourite books and sites about GTD.

David Allen - Getting Things Done
43 Folders
What is GTD ?
OmniFocus - The app I use for my GTD flow