Reader’s Setup: Sherród Faulks

Sherród Faulks is a developer and designer in NYC. He co-owns a software development and identity design company Soft Illuminations, Inc.. By day he designs user experiences and develops enterprise web apps using Ruby on Rails, and by night he works on his iPhone app, Butcher.

Sherród’s Setup:

1. What does your desk look like?

Sherrod Faulks - Desk Front.jpg

Sherrod Faulks - 2. Desk Side.jpg

Sherrod Faulks - 3. Under Desk.jpg

2. Current Mac Setup

I have a 15″ 2.4GHz MacBook Pro with 4GB of RAM and a paltry 200GB hard drive, 30GB of which runs Windows XP in Parallels. I have a 1TB Western Digital My Book Studio Edition as a backup drive, and a 24″ Westinghouse LN2410NM LCD.

The desk itself is from IKEA. It is a VIKA GRUVAN desk which is glass topped, and uses VIKA FAGERLID legs which have two levels of storage.

3. Why are you using this setup?

I converted to a Mac about six years ago with the PowerMac G5. I converted simply because I found I needed to get stuff done. That was when I was a senior in High School, and it’s even more true today. I use a MacBook Pro as my sole machine because it’s portable without sacrificing power. I got the WD drive when my old 15″ MBP’s 320GB drive filled up completely in the middle of the day, and it’s been my savior ever since.

The desk is just as important as the machines on top of it. I chose this desk set because it’s very easy on the eyes, enormous in size (it will easily seat 2-4 people), easy to maintain (the top is a single sheet of glass), and has lots of storage space (note the stuff on the other side of the space under the desk) without feeling closed. Underneath, in the legs, I keep all of my technical, design and leisure books.

4. What software do you use on a daily basis and for what do you use it?

  • Apple Mail: I have tens of thousands of emails and Mail gets through it all pretty ably.
  • NetNewsWire: I have to stay on top of what’s going on in the tech, design, food and photography worlds.
  • Safari: Battle-tested, standards-compliant, blazing fast and ahead of the game.
  • iChat: I work with people around the world and video chatting makes everyone feel a little bit closer together.
  • iTunes: Music is essential to concentration for me.
  • TextMate: My text editor of choice, it is fast, unobtrusive and simple.
  • TextEdit: I use TextEdit to jot down longer notes or as an extended clipboard. I prefer it over TextMate for simpler things because it autosaves and handles rich text and HTML.
  • The Hit List: I’m a lister, and THL really gets out of my way and lets me get my tasks in and manage them intuitively.
  • Photoshop CS3: It’s the gold standard for anything image-related. I use it for web and graphic design.
  • Tweetie: Again, I try to stay on top of things and tweetie is a great portal into the twitterverse.
  • Cornerstone: I prefer Subversion for version control and Cornerstone is easy to use but really powerful. And it’s diff features are unparalleled.
  • Querious: Querious is hands-down the best MySQL GUI available for the Mac. It’s extremely fast, rich and, most importantly, stable.

5. Do you own any other Mac gear?

I have a 1st-generation, 4GB (You know, the one discontinued mere months after its debut?) iPhone which I also use for development.

6. Do you have any future upgrades planned?

I plan to upgrade to a 15″ MacBook Pro with the matte screen, and at least 500GB of storage. I’ll probably get another identical display.

More Sweet Setups

Sherród’s setup is just one in a series of sweet Mac Setups.

Reader’s Setup: Sherród Faulks