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How in the world do you do serious work on a 12" laptop? Even if I wasn't cursed with sausage-fingered, basketball-palming hands to type with, I'd go stark rav

by douche 11y ago

How in the world do you do serious work on a 12" laptop? Even if I wasn't cursed with sausage-fingered, basketball-palming hands to type with, I'd go stark raving mad having that little screen real-estate.

jsolson 11y ago
At work I use exclusively an 11" MacBook Air. One terminal, ssh'd into one tmux session. Typically running emacs in two column mode among many other tmux tabs. I don't get distracted much :)
MichaelGG 11y ago
I switched to a 12" X series ThinkPad 5 years ago, coming from 15"+ laptops. It's actually great. Instead of trying to fit so much, I just focus on the task at hand. No doubt, in-editor docs/autocomplete help a lot. Plus I stopped doing web work which has been a huge boon overall. Note I started with a 1280x800 but now all screens are 1080p or other 16:9. That ratio is the real killer. It also provided incentive to get a proper tiling window manager.
- douche 11y ago
  I think I'm ruined... I got used to a quad-27" monitor desktop with a full-sized mechanical keyboard and a nice wireless mouse. Going back to a single screen, weird laptop keyboard, and touchpad is excruciating
  - ghshephard 11y ago
    I live in tmux on my 13" MBAir. For a while, at work, I had a 30" monitor, but I realized that after a few months, I never bothered to plug in my laptop, and, those rare times that I did, I rarely looked at it. About the only exception was when working with Visio. The large monitor is pretty handy then.
    - Symbiote 11y ago
      Do you (and the parent commenters) not find it uncomfortable and unhealthy to work crampt over a laptop all the time? It's certainly not compliant with European health and safety regulations. Here, we have to provide an external keyboard, monitor and mouse for anyone that uses a laptop for more than an hour. (British regulations, since they're obviously in English, laptops on page 50 http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l26.htm http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l26.htm )
      - MichaelGG 11y ago
        The IBM ThinkPad keyboards are full size so it's fine. Oddly, it's the only laptop keyboard I've used that doesn't give me RSI pain. The neck issue is an issue sometimes, though. When I'm docked I use a Matias Ergo Pro (almost a great keyboard, but unfortunately the only one of it's form factor) and a 1920x1300 display.
erikpukinskis 11y ago
Alt+tab Screen real estate is like coffee. If you're addicted you need it. It can be wonderful in specific situations. But people who never start aren't really at any disadvantage.
danieldk 11y ago
I connect a large external screen, keyboard and magic trackpad. On the road, 12" works fine for me for doing work. As some others here, I mostly live in tmux.

by douche 11y ago

jsolson 11y ago

At work I use exclusively an 11" MacBook Air. One terminal, ssh'd into one tmux session. Typically running emacs in two column mode among many other tmux tabs. I don't get distracted much :)

MichaelGG 11y ago

I switched to a 12" X series ThinkPad 5 years ago, coming from 15"+ laptops. It's actually great. Instead of trying to fit so much, I just focus on the task at hand. No doubt, in-editor docs/autocomplete help a lot. Plus I stopped doing web work which has been a huge boon overall. Note I started with a 1280x800 but now all screens are 1080p or other 16:9. That ratio is the real killer. It also provided incentive to get a proper tiling window manager.

douche 11y ago
I think I'm ruined... I got used to a quad-27" monitor desktop with a full-sized mechanical keyboard and a nice wireless mouse. Going back to a single screen, weird laptop keyboard, and touchpad is excruciating
- ghshephard 11y ago
  I live in tmux on my 13" MBAir. For a while, at work, I had a 30" monitor, but I realized that after a few months, I never bothered to plug in my laptop, and, those rare times that I did, I rarely looked at it. About the only exception was when working with Visio. The large monitor is pretty handy then.
  - Symbiote 11y ago
    Do you (and the parent commenters) not find it uncomfortable and unhealthy to work crampt over a laptop all the time? It's certainly not compliant with European health and safety regulations. Here, we have to provide an external keyboard, monitor and mouse for anyone that uses a laptop for more than an hour. (British regulations, since they're obviously in English, laptops on page 50 http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l26.htm http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l26.htm )
    - MichaelGG 11y ago
      The IBM ThinkPad keyboards are full size so it's fine. Oddly, it's the only laptop keyboard I've used that doesn't give me RSI pain. The neck issue is an issue sometimes, though. When I'm docked I use a Matias Ergo Pro (almost a great keyboard, but unfortunately the only one of it's form factor) and a 1920x1300 display.

erikpukinskis 11y ago

Alt+tab Screen real estate is like coffee. If you're addicted you need it. It can be wonderful in specific situations. But people who never start aren't really at any disadvantage.

danieldk 11y ago

I connect a large external screen, keyboard and magic trackpad. On the road, 12" works fine for me for doing work. As some others here, I mostly live in tmux.