7 ms·

I do this while freelancing/contracting as well. I have a macbook for client work only. While I don't have a one for each potential client, I do use a differe

by LanceH 5y ago

I do this while freelancing/contracting as well. I have a macbook for client work only. While I don't have a one for each potential client, I do use a different user for each client, and all data should remain in user space -- which is easy enough to accomplish since I need to maintain matching versions of databases anyway, there is no need to share a single data store.

dylan604 5y ago
The user per client on the computer sounds like a nice idea. I haven't done that, but can easily see the appeal. Nice one
- touisteur 5y ago
  Would almost be better with in addition a vm per customer or at least some kind of encrypted partition per user/customer. Not sure how easy it is under Linux.
  - kyleee 5y ago
    Just bite the bulllet and move to Qubes
    - petertodd 5y ago
      Another advantage of doing this on separate VMs on Qubes is it makes it easy to comply with end-of-contract requirements to destroy all data. Just delete the VMs, and if needed, old backups.
    - touisteur 5y ago
      Didn't know Qubes had such a feature (encrypted home partition/container). Will have a look, thanks.
  - asymptosis 5y ago
    > Not sure how easy it is under Linux. Not sure how easy it is on other OSes. On Linux, it's easy.
  - vladvasiliu 5y ago
    On the face of it, it looks fairly simple on Linux with the encrypted homes feature. Don't have the need for that, so I've never tested it in practice, though.
- handrous 5y ago
  It's a great system. The only real pain I've run into with it, on macOS anyway, is that you can't isolate iCloud accounts and still receive texts on your Mac. So unless you have a separate phone for each client, that's not so great. Also, the lack of profiles on iDevices means any client-specific apps (2fa stuff, for instance, or if you like to have Slack on your iDevice, or dev/testing apps, or whatever) ends up in a shared space on there.
  - Buttons840 5y ago
    I created a new iCloud account with my work email.
    - handrous 5y ago
      Right, the trouble's getting text messages and such through to your laptop (text message 2fa is so nice with a synced phone—auto fill!), if you have multiple clients. One work phone + personal phone (or tablets, or whatever) is fine. It's when you have three clients, and maybe they rotate out sometimes, that it gets to be a little annoying. ... unless you can add multiple iCloud accounts to one phone. I guess I've never tried, because I just assumed you couldn't. Though you'd still have the problem of things like dev builds and all that existing in the same space, and email accounts (on the phone) syncing to the same application without much separation, and all that.
      - ThePowerOfFuet 5y ago
        Why are you using SMS 2FA anyway?
- sleepybrett 5y ago
  I once worked with a guy in the early 2000s that did 1 laptop per major client project (this was local workflow type app stuff, so windows desktop clients with maybe some kind of data backend) when he was complete he literally took the laptop and put a label on it and put it on a shelf. He'd been burned once to many times on backwards compatibility and library quirks with windows.
jokethrowaway 5y ago
KDE has the concept of activities (think like, virtual desktop on steroids, with custom widgets and look) which I used for some time to split between clients' work. It was a fun gimmicky but I can't say I missed it once I had to start using a Mac.
- LinAGKar 5y ago
  I've started using that when working from home, putting the work stuff on a separate activity.
ska 5y ago
I've done this before with one VM per client. Makes archiving etc. simple also, and means that per-client setup stuff never tramples on each other. Gives an answer for how you firewall sensitive data also, e.g. every document you gave me never existed anywhere except in this (potentially encrypted) VM. Easy to delete cleanly.
- mark_l_watson 5y ago
  That sounds like a clean way to organize multiple clients. For some types of development, I find working on a remote server using SSH/Mosh/tmux works really well for me. I am retired now but I used to ask clients to rent a reasonably powerful VPS that we both had access to and just worked on that. I think this gave customers good control over their property (i.e., the work I did on their behalf).
ekzy 5y ago
I tried to use this approach before, but if I remember correctly Homebrew didn’t like it. I like to manage my software with Homebrew, but multi user simply wasn’t working
- Nextgrid 5y ago
  You can install Homebrew in a non-default directory like somewhere under your home directory. It requires every package to be rebuilt during install, but it's possible. This means you should even be able to get away without even escalating your privileges to root.
nine_k 5y ago
How do you handle brew? It makes all the /usr/local/bin stuff belong to the regular user which installed it. Other users had trouble working with brew-installed stuff, last time I tried a few years ago.
- vanpythonista 5y ago
  You can install brew in your home directory using the Untar Anywhere approach. I’m particular sceptical of how brew handles permissions, so I always install it to ~/homebrew. One thing to note, if you use this approach Homebrew will not use its precompiled binaries and build everything from source. https://docs.brew.sh/Installation#untar-anywhere https://docs.brew.sh/Installation#untar-anywhere
- Phurist 5y ago
  Use Nix instead.
vagrantJin 5y ago
> While I don't have a one for each potential client... So 6 clients = 6 computers...pardon me Macbooks is your ideal setup? I hope that was a joke. I really hope that was a joke.
midasz 5y ago
I do the same on Linux, I install software that I always use (DBeaver, Intellij, Spotify, 1Password, browsers, postman, docker stuff, etc) with my 'personal' user and when I switch clients I just create a new user and copy over my licenses. Then I use firefox for everything client related (their outlook, jira, etc) and just login to my gmail on chrome or brave or something.

by LanceH 5y ago

dylan604 5y ago

The user per client on the computer sounds like a nice idea. I haven't done that, but can easily see the appeal. Nice one

touisteur 5y ago
Would almost be better with in addition a vm per customer or at least some kind of encrypted partition per user/customer. Not sure how easy it is under Linux.
- kyleee 5y ago
  Just bite the bulllet and move to Qubes
  - petertodd 5y ago
    Another advantage of doing this on separate VMs on Qubes is it makes it easy to comply with end-of-contract requirements to destroy all data. Just delete the VMs, and if needed, old backups.
  - touisteur 5y ago
    Didn't know Qubes had such a feature (encrypted home partition/container). Will have a look, thanks.
- asymptosis 5y ago
  > Not sure how easy it is under Linux. Not sure how easy it is on other OSes. On Linux, it's easy.
- vladvasiliu 5y ago
  On the face of it, it looks fairly simple on Linux with the encrypted homes feature. Don't have the need for that, so I've never tested it in practice, though.
handrous 5y ago
It's a great system. The only real pain I've run into with it, on macOS anyway, is that you can't isolate iCloud accounts and still receive texts on your Mac. So unless you have a separate phone for each client, that's not so great. Also, the lack of profiles on iDevices means any client-specific apps (2fa stuff, for instance, or if you like to have Slack on your iDevice, or dev/testing apps, or whatever) ends up in a shared space on there.
- Buttons840 5y ago
  I created a new iCloud account with my work email.
  - handrous 5y ago
    Right, the trouble's getting text messages and such through to your laptop (text message 2fa is so nice with a synced phone—auto fill!), if you have multiple clients. One work phone + personal phone (or tablets, or whatever) is fine. It's when you have three clients, and maybe they rotate out sometimes, that it gets to be a little annoying. ... unless you can add multiple iCloud accounts to one phone. I guess I've never tried, because I just assumed you couldn't. Though you'd still have the problem of things like dev builds and all that existing in the same space, and email accounts (on the phone) syncing to the same application without much separation, and all that.
    - ThePowerOfFuet 5y ago
      Why are you using SMS 2FA anyway?
sleepybrett 5y ago
I once worked with a guy in the early 2000s that did 1 laptop per major client project (this was local workflow type app stuff, so windows desktop clients with maybe some kind of data backend) when he was complete he literally took the laptop and put a label on it and put it on a shelf. He'd been burned once to many times on backwards compatibility and library quirks with windows.

jokethrowaway 5y ago

KDE has the concept of activities (think like, virtual desktop on steroids, with custom widgets and look) which I used for some time to split between clients' work. It was a fun gimmicky but I can't say I missed it once I had to start using a Mac.

LinAGKar 5y ago
I've started using that when working from home, putting the work stuff on a separate activity.

ska 5y ago

I've done this before with one VM per client. Makes archiving etc. simple also, and means that per-client setup stuff never tramples on each other. Gives an answer for how you firewall sensitive data also, e.g. every document you gave me never existed anywhere except in this (potentially encrypted) VM. Easy to delete cleanly.

mark_l_watson 5y ago
That sounds like a clean way to organize multiple clients. For some types of development, I find working on a remote server using SSH/Mosh/tmux works really well for me. I am retired now but I used to ask clients to rent a reasonably powerful VPS that we both had access to and just worked on that. I think this gave customers good control over their property (i.e., the work I did on their behalf).

ekzy 5y ago

I tried to use this approach before, but if I remember correctly Homebrew didn’t like it. I like to manage my software with Homebrew, but multi user simply wasn’t working

Nextgrid 5y ago
You can install Homebrew in a non-default directory like somewhere under your home directory. It requires every package to be rebuilt during install, but it's possible. This means you should even be able to get away without even escalating your privileges to root.

nine_k 5y ago

How do you handle brew? It makes all the /usr/local/bin stuff belong to the regular user which installed it. Other users had trouble working with brew-installed stuff, last time I tried a few years ago.

vanpythonista 5y ago
You can install brew in your home directory using the Untar Anywhere approach. I’m particular sceptical of how brew handles permissions, so I always install it to ~/homebrew. One thing to note, if you use this approach Homebrew will not use its precompiled binaries and build everything from source. https://docs.brew.sh/Installation#untar-anywhere https://docs.brew.sh/Installation#untar-anywhere
Phurist 5y ago
Use Nix instead.

vagrantJin 5y ago

> While I don't have a one for each potential client... So 6 clients = 6 computers...pardon me Macbooks is your ideal setup? I hope that was a joke. I really hope that was a joke.

midasz 5y ago

I do the same on Linux, I install software that I always use (DBeaver, Intellij, Spotify, 1Password, browsers, postman, docker stuff, etc) with my 'personal' user and when I switch clients I just create a new user and copy over my licenses. Then I use firefox for everything client related (their outlook, jira, etc) and just login to my gmail on chrome or brave or something.