I hate images.
When I was first introduced to imaging as a young tech, I thought it was the best thing in the world. You take hundreds of computers that are fresh out of the box and you get them all to the same needed configuration en mass, with rare discrepancies. There are plenty of ways to deploy an image, with hard drives, thumb drives, boot to network, etc. A lot of thought and effort has gone into the imaging market, and I've used many of the products. Then I advanced enough in my career that I started being the guy making the images. Seems simple enough, but it turns out there's a lot of gotchas.
​
Whether I was deploying images or creating them, I started seeing things that just bugged me. This department wants a different image from that department. The image you just made doesn't have the drivers needed for the new chipset that just came out. That program has a severe security vulnerability and needs to be removed from every computer on the network (but it's on the image). What's that? The image is 6 months old and now spends hours installing updates before it can be deployed? The list goes on. It seems the answer to every issue was, create a new image FROM SCRATCH! I tried to mitigate the worst offenses by scripting updates and changes that needed to be done post imaging which resolved much of my frustration, and then I started scripting the image creation process. Then it hit me, if I'm scripting the image creation process and the updates to apply to a machine after, why do I need an image? Why not just script the entire computer setup process?
After years of developing and refinement, my machine set up process is this.
​

1. New machine comes in and needs to be setup.
2. I copy an appropriate config file to a prepare usb flash drive.
3. I connect ethernet to the new computer and boot to the flash drive.
4. I come back a couple hours later, do some basic quality checks, and hand the computer to the customer.

It makes my heart swell with pride when I see a computer install the latest version of Window 10, name itself, create accounts, install programs, configure settings, join a customers vpn if needed, join the domain, install our remote management tool, all that and more, then play a happy little tune at the end when it's done to alert me of it's victory. It's at the point where I've taken entry level techs and after giving them 5 minutes of instructions, they're able to prepare new machines for all of our clients. If a client get's a new machine at a remote site, all I need from them is a flash drive and a few minutes of their time, and they've initiated the prep process themselves. It's done using free reputable tools and self built powershell functions. If something needs to change, I take seconds to update a powershell file instead of taking hours to build a new image.
My question is this. Does anyone else see the value in this enough for me to attempt to document how to recreate the process outside of my environment? There's quite a few parts to make it all come together if starting from scratch, but if you're fed up with images or want something better then setting up machines from scratch, it might just be worth the effort.

################ Response

Well this is surprising. When I posted, I was 90% sure that I've been missing something all these years and I'd be torn apart. This has given me the feedback I was looking for that validates I might be on to something. A few of you are basically doing the same thing. A few of you are wondering why not use packaging from the manufacturer, or some other hands off approach. My main answer to that is I want to see the process in action, and I want to keep the process in-house. If something breaks due to a change, or is no longer applicable, I want to see it before the customer does. With this process, the Rapid Iterative Testing and Evaluation process is almost instant. We also keep machines in stock that our clients buy, we don't know always know were a machine is destine for when the order is placed. All of that being said, I've seen a few of you post a few things I need to learn from, and will be doing so soon. For now, I'll share what I have as I try to strip out my companies proprietary knowledge. I'll edit this comment with more. My process is just thorough (and complex) enough that a dedicated blog might be a better format, but I'll do my best.
Creating the basic documentation now, will update soon. Just know this it's time to brush up on you powershell skills.

Outline of the process in action

• Boot to the USB (Human interaction needed)
• The USB is a Windows 10 installer with an autounattend.xml which automatically installs the OS fresh with Microsoft's vanilla windows.
  • A fresh install removes the complexity and potential security vulnerabilities that OEMs introduce.
  • USB is made using the Windows Media Creation tool at https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
• Once install is complete and Windows boots to the OOBE, it detects a PPKG file we've put on the root of the USB and begins automatically applying it.
  • The PPKG file (Provisioning Package) is created with Windows Configuration Designer (WCD)
  • WCD comes as apart of Windows ADK (assessment and deployment kit) but I just download it separately from the Windows App Store.
    • Link: https://www.microsoft.com/store/productId/9NBLGGH4TX22
    • Documentation: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/configuration/provisioning-packages/provisioning-packages
  • Provisioning packages offer a lot of potential, but break if you try to do too much. Keeping it simple keeps it working.
• The provisioning package completes the following steps:
  • Creates a local admin account.
  • Names the machine.
  • Makes a working directory on the OS drive.
  • Installs network and chipset drivers from the USB if no network is detected.
    • Packaged and run using Snappy Driver Installer
  • Optionally connects to wifi.
    • Careful with this, if no wifi adapter is detected, the package will just fail outright. Only use this if ethernet or using an ethernet to usb adapter isn't an option.
  • Downloads a password protected self-extracting file containing powershell scripts and any configuration files needed.
  • Runs a short powershell script which:
    • Sets needed automatic logon registry keys
    • Sets Numlock as default on keyboard
    • Ensures the Machine OOBE, User OOBE, and Privacy Experience are all disabled.
    • Sets initial payload powershell script to on initial logon.
  • Reboots the computer.
• Windows boots into the local admin account automatically and launces the first main powershell script.
  • At this point the USB drive a can be removed and used on another computer.
  • Imports a maintained list of powershell functions.
  • Starts a Transcript Log file for QA and troubleshooting purposes.
  • Sets timezone and updates the clock.
  • Installs Chocolatey (It's like apt-get for Windows).
  • Installs Powershell Core (or whatever it's called now).
  • Uses Chocolatey and NinitePro to install all needed free programs.
  • Installs custom software such as VPN client.
  • Runs Windows 10 Decrapifier to clean up games from work computers and more.
  • Installs Office 365 (or 2016, etc) with site specific configuration file.
  • Add needed web shortcuts.
  • Add needed network shortcuts
  • Disable Fast Startup (cause when I tell my computer to shut down, I don't mean hibernate!!!)
  • Set a daily reboot scheduled task for 3am if the computer is idle. (No more tickets of "My computer is acting slow and weird", due to 180 day+ uptimes. Encourages people to save their work once in a while).
  • Install Windows Updates (We keep the USB drives up to date with lastest build number).
  • Installs Windows Apps updates.
  • Install Dell updates (Can HP/Lenovo/ other update utilities be fully scripted?)
  • Sets Ninite (or chocolatey) to update all possible apps at every computer boot (3am in the morning with scheduled restart).
  • Further rename the computer if manual input is needed, some sites are picky.
  • Set autologon for next cycle.
  • Set next script to run.
  • Reboot the computer.
• Next script runs as a follow up script.
  • Imports a maintained list of powershell functions.
  • Starts a Transcript Log file for QA and troubleshooting purposes.
  • Installs default app settings. Changing PDF to open in Adobe, etc.
  • Second round of Windows, Apps, Driver updates, as there's always something.
  • Import the site's wifi profile if a wifi adapter is detected.
  • Detect if the site's DC is pingable, connect to site's VPN if not.
  • Join the site's domain.
  • Set autologon for next cycle.
  • Set next script to run.
  • Reboot the computer.
• Final script runs.
  • It basically just installs our RMM agent which takes a while and is finicky. A fresh reboot beforehand helps.
  • Plays a little audible tune to alert any nearby technicians that it's done.
  • Cleans up the scripts folder, which may contain licensing info and sensitive passwords for joining VPN and the domain.
• Technician review
  • Check logs for errors.
  • Checks site baseline needs are actually configure (trust, but verify).
  • Checks if the specific user had any specific program requests above site baseline.
  • Ensures the computer is showing up in our Remote Monitoring & Management software.
  • Deploy to the user!

**I'll work on details steps this weekend.**Please be patient though. Work is busy. I'm also a husband, father to a baby, dog walker, handy man and college student even though I'm in my 30's. So many things I haven't figured out how to automate!

Infrastructure Setup, Step 1: Prepare your External Site Specific Code Repository

We use an ftp server that is publicly available, but you could use samba or other types as well.When I refer to a "Site", this just means a set of customizations. It could refer to a client, department, or anything that differentiates one setup from another.

• Keep it consistent as the main folder containing the sites folders will be launch point for everything, with each site being a variable that is used to pull down specific information.
• This Repository must be accessible with minimal effort from anywhere you plan on prepping a machine. If you have remote sites that aren't on the LAN, plan for it!
• If it will be accessible to the internet, encrypt EVERYTHING you upload (I'll cover that later).
• Create the folder structure in the style of
  • ftp://download.yoursite.com/Sites/Site1
  • ftp://download.yoursite.com/Sites/Site2
  • ftp://download.yoursite.com/Sites/Site3
  • etc
• Keep the site codes short if possible, with no spaces.
• The base of this folder structure will be referred to as $ExternalSitesPath

Infrastructure Setup, Step 2: Prepare your Internal Site Code Workspace

This is where we build the code, review it, update it, etc. This is where the code can live free with sensitive information, so make sure it's secured. We keep ours on a SharePoint site synced to our computers, so we can work freely with it.

• Setup a mirrored folder structure to the External Site
• Create an additional template folder, where you maintain the "Ideal state of code".
• When setting up a new site, copy that template folder to begin your setup, then customize as needed.
• The base of this folder structure will be referred to as $InternalSitesPath

Infrastructure Setup, Step 3: Set up a Chocolatey Proxy/Repo

Please note, Chocolatey is AWESOME but they aren't set up to support hundreds of thousands of machines. Get to know it, they have awesome documentation. You can play around with it by installing it on your machine here. https://chocolatey.org/install#individual
Beyond that, if you start installing it on a bunch of machines, they'll block you. If you open a ticket about it, they'll send you a nice little email explaining what's up ( https://chocolatey.org/docs/community-packages-disclaimer#rate-limiting ) and how to set up a proxy (https://docs.chocolatey.org/en-us/features/host-packages).As for me, I took the Nexus repository route. I set it up on a linux VM. Everything is free and I love it.
Last but not least, when you do this, you'll want your own version of the chocolatey install script that set's it up from your server. Fortunately, since I learned the hard way how to do this, they've made it super simple. https://chocolatey.org/install#organization

Infrastructure Setup, Step 4: Prepare your Functions

Modularize your powershell functions! Automation needs maintanence, as the things we're automating change over time. How we install a program today might be different from how we install it tomorrow if the program installer changes. If you have 30+ sites and need to update the code to do something, you don't want to have to go and update all 30 site's code (TRUST ME). Instead, have them all import your functions. Then you update just one file, and they all benefit from it instantly.Some firewalls will block ps1 files and psm files, so I store everything needed as txt files and let powershell just use the content. Here is the boot strapper I use to to enable SSL and import the functions from an https github repo. I keep this on a http server as a text file and I have a tinyurl linking to it. I call it with:iwr -usebasicparsing | iex

Write-Host -NoNewLine "`n - Retrieving IT's Functions -"
$greenCheck = @{
Object = [Char]8730
ForegroundColor = 'Green'
NoNewLine = $true
}
$progressPreference = 'silentlyContinue'
[System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol -bor 3072
$Destination = $Env:temp + "\ATGPS.psm1"
Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force
(Invoke-WebRequest -UseBasicParsing).Content | Out-File -FilePath $Destination
Import-Module $Destination -Global -Force
If (Get-Module -Name ATGPS -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue){
Write-Host u/greenCheck;Write-Host -NoNewLine " Functions successfully loaded ";Write-Host u/greenCheck;Write-Host "-`n - Get-ITFunctions will give a list of custom functions -`n"
} Else {
Write-Host "Functions were not successfully loaded. "
}

A list of functions will be available at the bottom.

Site Setup, Step 1: Prepare your first Site file structure

Navigate to $InternalSitesPath
If the site you are looking to create a package for doesn't exist, create a folder for it. Then create the following folder structure

• \PPKG\_Powershell\Exclude
• \PPKG\WCD
• Create a strong random password (I use dinopass as humans suck at randomness). Create a txt file under the Exclude folder called SFX Password.txt. Paste the random password into this file.

Site Setup, Step 2: Prepare the Provisioning Package File

Download and install "Windows Configuration Designer" available on the Windows App Store https://www.microsoft.com/store/productId/9NBLGGH4TX22
Documentation: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/configuration/provisioning-packages/provisioning-packages
Note: You'll see a lot of awesome options in here. Keep it as simple as possible as things can easily go wrong with this. We can set those options later and more reliably in powershell.

• Open Windows Configuration Designer and select "Provision Desktop Devices"
• Name the project with the site code.
• Set the project folder to $InternalSitesPath\\PPKG\WCD
• Step: Set up Device
  • Device Name: -%SERIAL%
  • Product Key: Enter a Windows Volume License if they have one
  • Configure devices for shared use: No
  • Remove pre-installed software: No
• Step: Set up network
  • Select No
• Step: Account Management
  • Select "Local Admin"
  • User name: Local
  • Password:
    • Note, when dealing with multiple sites it's easier to use a common or almost common local admin password. For security, I HIGHLY advise using your RMM to deploy a much more secure password to all machines post deployment, or use that here.
• Step: Add applications
  • Skip this
• Step: Add certificates
  • Skip this
• Step: Finish
  • Click "Switch to advanced editor" in the bottom left.

After creating a basic provisioning package and getting into the Advanced View, navigate on the left to
Runtime settings > ProvisioningCommands > PrimaryContext > Command.
Create these basic commands. Do them in order, as reordering them later can corrupt the package. These do not handle change well without corrupting, we we set up some basic commands to download powershell scripts and let those do the brunt of the work. To create a command, put your cursor in the "Name:" field, type in the command name, then click the "Add" button" in the bottom right. We can customize the commands after they're added.
These are the basic provisioning commands meant to make way for the powershell scripts. Make sure to customize each url and filepath according to the site.
**HINT: Copy everything below into a notepad program, and use CTRL+H to replace with your site's shortcode, then copy from there into Window's Config Designer. Also replace with the strong password created earlier.--Just realized images aren't allow in /MSP, so sad--
Commands to create (no spaces allowed here)

• MakeDir
• InstallDrivers
• DownloadScripts
• ExtractScripts
• PowershellPass1

You'll notice that these commands are highlighted in red on the left. We need to give more information for each. Also note that

• #0 Creates the folders to download to
  • [Name] MakeDir
  • [ComandLine] cmd /C "mkdir C:\IT\PPKG"
  • [ContinueInstall] True
  • [RestartRequired] False
• #1 Install needed Ethernet, Chipset, and USB drivers if needed
  • [Name] InstallDrivers
  • [ComandLine] PowerShell.exe -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "(Get-Volume).DriveLetter | ForEach-Object {If (Test-Path -Path ($_ + ':\InstallNetwork.ps1')) {Set-Location ($_ + ':\') ; & .\InstallNetwork.ps1}}"
  • [ContinueInstall] True
  • [RestartRequired] True
• #2 Downloads the powershell scripts self extracting executable. Swap out with your site.
  • [Name] DownloadScripts
  • [CommandLine] PowerShell.exe -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "[System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [System.Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol -bor 3072;(New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadFile('$ExternalSitesPath//_Powershell.exe', 'C:\IT\PPKG\_Powershell.exe')"
  • [ContinueInstall] True
  • [RestartRequired] False
• #3 Extracts the files from the self-extracting executable. Replace with the password generated earlier.
  • [Name] ExtractScripts
  • [CommandLine] C:\IT\PPKG\_Powershell.exe -p -oC:\IT\PPKG -y
  • [ContinueInstall] True
  • [RestartRequired] False
• #4 Run the main pass1 powershell script. Swap out with your site.
  • [Name] PowershellPass1
  • [CommandLine] PowerShell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File - C:\IT\PPKG\_Pass1.ps1
  • [ContinueInstall] True
  • [RestartRequired] True

That's it for the provisioning package configuration! Now we just need to export the file to a ppkg package file.

• Save the package from File > Save. Click OK to the "Keep your info secure" dialogue.
• Click "Export" > "Provisioning Package"
• Change Owner to IT Admin and click Next\.
• Don't encrypt or sign the package (Unless you're really ambitious). Click Next.
• Click Next after reviewing the save location.
• Click Build, and then Finish.

Please check the comments for more.

Never thought I'd create a "This field must be less than 40000 characters long" message.
Comment Links:

• Functions - https://ambitions.sharefile.com/d-s0995d289621e41039ed2e6d059d98f41
• Site Setup, Step 3: Prepare the Powershell Scripts (Start) - https://www.reddit.com/msp/comments/k6do1e/windows_provisioning_packages_powershell_who/gfazg0b?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
• - Site Setup, Step 3: Prepare the Powershell Scripts (Continued) - https://www.reddit.com/msp/comments/k6do1e/windows_provisioning_packages_powershell_who/ggjnus2?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
• Site Setup, Step 3: Prepare the Powershell Scripts (Still Continued) - https://www.reddit.com/msp/comments/k6do1e/windows_provisioning_packages_powershell_who/gfazhns?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
• Packaging and Uploading the files - https://www.reddit.com/msp/comments/k6do1e/windows_provisioning_packages_powershell_who/gfejlay?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
• Preparing the usb stick & Deploying the package - https://www.reddit.com/msp/comments/k6do1e/windows_provisioning_packages_powershell_who/gfeualo?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

• Tweak name & description (Most descriptions I used are the developer’s one ,some are from idownloadblog.com and some I added ,as not all tweaks has description and some has vague or very long description).
• Repo.
• Free or Paid&Price.

Tweak list :
App Firewall (iOS 10-13) : Take control of apps' network access with AppFirewall! AppFirewall intercepts outbound connections and prompts for your permission before continuing, similar to iOS' other permissions. Afterwards, you can manage which sites are allowed & blocked in settings. Repo : http://apt.thebigboss.org/repofiles/cydia/. Free.
DoubleCut : let’s you bind text to a specific key and you can choose double tap, triple tap or hold. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
WiCarrier : Replaces status bar's carrier name field with the currently connected WiFi network. Repo : https://rpetri.ch/repo/. Free.
WiFiCarrier+ : WiFi network name and IP address in status bar. Repo : https://phil-highrez.github.io/repo/. Free.
MYbloXX : System wide Ad blocker. Repo : https://myxxdev.github.io/. Free.
BlockYouX : Systemwide Ads blocker. Repo : https://cydia.ceadd.ca/. Free.
UHB - iOS 9/10/11/12 (Untrusted Hosts Blocker) : System wide ads blocker. Repo : https://repo.thireus.com/. Free.
No Typing Indicator 13 : This tweak blocks the typing indicators from showing in iMessage. You can still see others typing but they will not see you typing. Repo : https://cydia.ceadd.ca/. Free.
AppStore++ : Allow downgrade apps in AppStore , block updates ,pypass 200MB download limit , disable search ads & disable app thinning. Repo : https://cokepokes.github.io/. Free.
SiriUnlock : Allow Siri to access sensitive data when phone is locked (i.e read text messages , show notes & contacts). Repo : https://cokepokes.github.io/. Free.
Kairos 3 : Kairos makes it easy to schedule messages to be sent at specific times. With options to have messages repeat to send on certain days of the week. Repo : https://supporter.cpdigitaldarkroom.com/repo/. Paid : 10$
TabBlocker : TabBlocker is able to block the opening of new tabs for specified websites.A lot of times when I try to watch a video, or open certain webpages that contain allot of ads. I get redirected to a new tab almost directly. TabBlocker will ask you if the webpage is allowed to open new tabs, or just block them. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
Spy : Allow you to Log and share usage of your apps when lending your phone to someone and see what apps tried to open and what time. Also has the ability to lock the phone or start alarm when chosen apps are lunched . Activation by CC toggle or Activator gesture. Repo : https://repo.packix.com/. Paid : 1.99$
Truecuts : Truecuts is a tweak for Siri Shortcuts that enables all automation triggers to run without prompting. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
StopShortcutsNotifications : This tweak prevents the shortcuts app from sending notifications. Repo : http://itsjafer.com/repo/. Free.
iCleaner Pro : iCleaner can free up space by removing unnecessary files from your device. Also allow you to manage Launch Daemons, Substrate addons & Preference Bundles. Repo : https://ib-soft.net/cydia/beta/. Free.
iSponsorBlock : iSponsorBlock | Automatically skip annoying sponsorships in YouTube videos. Repo : https://galactic-dev.github.io/. Free.
Messenger No Ads : Remove ads for Facebook Messenger app. Disable read receipt. Disable typing indicator and more. Repo : https://haoict.github.io/cydia/. Free.
HalFiPad : iPhone X Gestures: iPad StatusBarFloating Dock. Split & Slide Over. iPhone X Keyboard. Dark Keyboard. Swipe To Screenshot and more. And more features. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
LocationService (CCSupport) : You can turn on / off LocationService from the control center. Repo : https://cydia.ichitaso.com/. Free.
CCLinker : This tweak will let you navigate to the respective settings for the Control Center Module by using Gestures! Repo : Packix. Free.
WiFi List : See all the WiFi password you entered in your device (or another device if you have iCloud) You can even create a QR code for easy sharing. Repo : https://www.icaughtuapp.com/repo/. Free.
FreePIP : FreePIP is a tweak to un-snap and scale the view of Picture-in-Picture on iOS unlimitedly. Features : Snap / Un-snap the view by long-press the PiP view. Unlimited scaling. Repo : Packix. Free.
Similar tweak to FreePIP is BigPiPEnergy : Repo : http://itsjafer.com/repo/. Free.
CCModules Pro : Cellular Data expandable view. WiFi expandable view. Bluetooth expandable view. Hotspot button gesture. Power Actions module. Repo : Packix. Paid : 2.50$
CCModules : Add extra modules to your CC ( I use it to add silent mode ). Repo : https://jb365.github.io/. Free.
CC On & Off : toggle off WiFi and Bluetooth from CC. Repo : https://poomsmart.github.io/repo/. Free.
Snapper 2 : Snapper is a tweak that lets you crop a portion of the screen and keep it floating on the screen. Copy text from images to your clipboard. Repo : Packix. Paid : 3.00$
GoodWiFi : Remove RSSI Limit. Show Know Networks. Show Mac Address. Repo : https://julioverne.github.io/. Free.
MusiLyric : Fetch Lyrics on Music, Spotify, TIDAL, Pandora & LockScreen. Fetch in Background with best performance no Lags. After Fetch Lyric will Available Offline. Use Private API Musixmatch Database. Repo : https://julioverne.github.io/. Free.
Lyricify : With Lyricify you can easily view the lyrics to your songs on your lock screen. With lyrics support for songs played through Spotify, Soundcloud, TIDAL, Apple Music or any other prominent streaming service. Repo : Chariz. Paid 0.99$
DynamicTimer : DynamicTimer will dynamically change the timer sound between "Stop Playing" and a ringtone. If there is any music playing when the timer goes off it will stop it otherwise it will play the ringtone you set up in the settings. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
CarBridge (iOS 13, Lite) : View any app in CarPlay! Features include: View your device's screen on your CarPlay enabled display Watch DRM-free videos and play games directly on your car (google to check DRM status) Control your phone with touch right from your car without picking your phone up Activate your phone's home button by tapping the portal icon in the CarPlay dock. Repo : Packix. Paid : 4.99$
TFDidThatSay?: See what those pesky "[deleted]" comments and posts were without leaving Reddit! Repo : https://lint.github.io/repo/. Free.
ReProvision : keep applications signed even after 7 days are up. Automatically resigning of locally provisioned applications. Repo : https://repo.incendo.ws/. Free.
Sentinel : Sentinel is designed to help you avoid having to re-jailbreaking your device when you run out of battery. When the battery charge reaches a user-set percentage it will initiate a fake shutdown. Repo : https://repo.dynastic.co. Free.
Harpy : List all users on your local network/hotspot. Block Users from connecting to the internet on your local network. Block users from using your hotspot network. Repo : Packix. Paid : 1.49$
Choicy : Disable tweak injection for every process individually. Configure each tweak dylib for every process individually. Disable tweaks globally (with the ability to set exceptions for individual processes). Option for an application shortcut to launch the application with or without tweaks. Repo : https://opa334.github.io/. Free.
Safari Plus : Force Https. Upload any file and download manager. Custom user agent. And many more privacy, actions , gestures and customization for Safari. Repo : https://opa334.github.io/. Free.
White Point Module : Control Center module to toggle the "Reduce White Point" functionality. Long press / force touch to change the intensity. Repo : https://opa334.github.io/. Free.
ScreenshotActions : Copy latest screenshot to the clipboard & delete it. Uploading screenshots directly to Imgur. Share screenshots. Repo : Packix. Free.
SwipeToDeleteContact : Simple Swipe to delete an Contact. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
FLEXing : Open Flex anywhere! Repo : https://nscake.github.io/. Free.
HostsBlockerToggle (beta) : disable / enable host file from CC. Repo : https://petitstrawberry.github.io/cydia/. Free.
DontStopMyCall : It disable hangup of phone’s call when press lock button. Answer incoming call by pressing lock button 2 times. Pressing lock button 3 times will answer call using speaker directly. Repo : Packix. Paid : 1.50$
SwipeExtenderX : supercharges the iOS keyboard with up to 20 different swipe gesture-based actions to help make the process of typing on an iPhone even easier than it already is. Repo : https://repo.chariz.com/. Paid : 2.49$
SITUM Pro : SITUM Pro adds a new button to your Text Selection Menu which helps you look up the text you selected. Also with translation feature. Repo : Packix. Paid : 1.50$
VolSkip11 : Skip tracks & play/pause with volume buttons. Repo : https://cydia.rob311.com/repo/. Free.
Powercuff : Exposes access to hidden power throttling modes for better battery life. Repo : https://rpetri.ch/repo/. Free.
ConfirmPasteboard : Allow or deny apps accessing the clipboard. Repo : https://repo.co.k. Free.
NoClipboardForYou : Prevent apps from accessing your clipboard. Configure from Settings. Repo : https://shiftcmdk.github.io/repo/. Free.
Succession : Restore without updating. Repo : https://samgisaninja.github.io/. Free.
CCRinger13: Add a slider for ringer to control center volume module. Repo : https://shepgoba.github.io/. Free.
Night Shift Module : Change night shift from control center. Repo : https://shepgoba.github.io/. Free.
FUGap : Get rid of the ugly gap at the top of the control center !! Repo : Packix. Free.
YouPIP : picture in picture for YouTube &twitch . Repo : https://spicat.github.io/. Free. Best combination is YouPIP 0.0.6.2 and YouTube 15.22.4
Apps Manager : Wipe , backup , restore Appdata for installed apps. Repo : http://tigisoftware.com/cydia/. Free.
Filza File Manager 64-bit : File manager. Repo : http://tigisoftware.com/cydia/. Free.
YouTube Reborn : Features : - No Homescreen and No Video Ads (Both are on by default) - Enable Background Playback. - Allow HD On Cellular. - Disable Age Restriction. - No Stories (Beta). - Disable YouTube Kids Popup. - Enable iPad Style On iPhone. - Hide Tab Bar Labels- Hide Tabs (Explore, Upload [+], Subscriptions, Libary). - Picture-In-Picture (iOS 14+)- Video. - Downloading. - and many more features. Repo : https://repo.twickd.com. Free.
DockX : Add pasteboard shortcuts to your keyboard dock! Repo : http://udevsharold.github.io/repo/. Free.
Shortmoji : Bring life back into your keyboard by bringing tons of useful functionalities to the unused keyboard space. Shortmoji comes packed with tons of options to customize Keyboard, Predictive Bar and Keyboard Dock. Repo : https://miro92.com/repo/. Free.
Flex 3 Beta : Flex 3 is an incredible platform that lets jailbreakers create their own patches for the system or for installed apps.Moreover, a cloud-based system lets users mingle with one another by sharing their patches with the rest of the Flex 3 community. Repo : http://getdelta.co/. Free.
Activator : centralized gestures , buttons and shortcut management for iOS. Repo : https://rpetri.ch/repo/. Free.
Relocate Reborn : Minimalist GPS spoofer iOS 13+. Repo : https://repo.nepeta.me/. Repo is down , get it from here https://archive.org/details/relocate-tweak-module-and-app. Free.
CopyLog : CopyLog is a powerful clipboard history manager for iOS, it’s easy to use, works on both iPhone and iPad and will help you keep track of what you’ve copied on your device. Repo : Packix. Paid :2.49$
AppSync Unified : AppSync Unified is a tweak that patches installd to allow for the installation of unsigned, fakesigned, or ad-hoc signed IPA packages on an iOS device. AppSync Unified can be used to downgrade or clone installed apps, to download fakesigned IPAs. Repo : https://cydia.akemi.ai/. Free.
CallBar XS (iOS 12/13) : Callbar re-design the incoming calls view and allow you to use your device while it’s ringing or while in a call . Answer , decline or dismiss a call with ease without stopping what you’re doing. Repo : https://limneos.net/repo/. Paid : 3.99$
TetherMe for iOS8+ : Enables the native tethering for your device and give you the option to share data from data from a VPN or to share a WiF connection to Usb. Also allow you to edit APN settings. Repo : http://repo.tetherme.net/. Paid : 4.99$
CocoaTop : show CPU , memory usage...etc for processes&apps and allow to terminate/kill processes &apps. GitHub : https://d0m0.github.io. Repo : Bigboss. Free
RoadRunner : RoadRunner excludes the current now playing app from being killed when SpringBoard restarts. There's an option to exclude all running apps with the ability to whitelist/blacklist certain apps. Repo : https://henrikssonbrothers.com/cydia/repo/. Paid : 2.25$
Keyboard Accio : This tweak makes the "global" key always switch between the first and second input modes of your keyboard settings. Repo : BigBoss. Free.
ImLyingDownDamnit : A tweak to correct auto-rotate, so you can rotate your device freely, while lying down, relative to your face! Auto-detect typical lying down behaviour to avoid prompting you. "Rollover" prompts, to correct the orientation if you change direction in bed! and more features! Repo : https://repo.dynastic.co/. Paid : 1.49$
System Info : Show extra device and battery information and save blobs from settings. Repo : https://apt.xninja.xyz/. Free.
Zenumbra : Show number of installed packages per repo for Zebra. Repo : https://foxfort.yourepo.com. Free.
Note : Order of list doesn’t mean anything and I added more in the comment section as post reached it’s maximum words capacity . Again, tweaks in my comment below are as important as in the main post.
The list continues here https://reddit.com/jailbreak/comments/injcwv/_/g47xjw2/?context=1
& here https://reddit.com/jailbreak/comments/injcwv/_/g75vsw9/?.context=1
Any new tweaks that is not in the list and you think it’s important , please let me know, I’ll take a look. Thanks.

Now's about the time of year when people start making resolutions and thinking about self-improvement for the new year. I kind of realized I'm already doing all that in a Cosmic Frontier context, and have been for a few months now. I want to gain new skills that will help me make plug-ins for Cosmic Frontier: Override and the Kestrel Engine. I imagine a bunch of you are thinking along the same lines, but maybe not all of you are quite sure where to start. So I'm making this thread as a way of outlining what I see as a comprehensive plan for becoming a great Cosmic Frontier modder when the game is released.
What makes me such an expert? I'm not, really. I have worked on some big plug-ins, I've closely observed some others under development for literal decades now, I used to moderate the old Ambrosia forum EV Developer's Corner, and I'm currently working on a very large plug-in for EV Nova which will be ported over to Cosmic Frontier: Override. I'm also planning other plug-ins in the future. But I'm still just a regular guy who's learning as he goes, and there's always more to learn. These are just the five action items I feel are good things to do, as best I can think of, along with some helpful links for anyone wanting to get started on improving in these areas themselves.
So here is mrxak's Five Point Plan for Cosmic Frontier Modding Preparations in 2021:

1. Learn Nova's Resources
2. Learn Lua
3. Learn Digital Art
4. Learn KDL
5. Read a Book

Point #1: Learn Nova's Resources
Cosmic Frontier: Override will be featuring backwards compatibility with EV Nova's plug-ins. There's never been a better time to learn how those plug-ins were made. Start familiarizing yourself with the EV Nova Bible. Try out a program to look at the resources that built the EV Nova scenario, and make a simple plug-in for EV Nova adding to or modifying the EV Nova resources. Learn what you can and can't do with resource-based plug-ins.
It's likely that CFO will expand somewhat on the EV Nova engine functionality, but you'll be able to make plug-ins for the new game with the same knowledge you gain making plug-ins for EV Nova today. The first plug-ins officially released for Cosmic Frontier will almost certainly be ports from EV Nova. You could, if you really wanted to, start development on a Cosmic Frontier plug-in right now, and changes, if any, to account for the Kestrel engine's differences would be minor at best. So, why wait? Learn how Nova's resources work and get started on developing the CFO plug-in or TC of your dreams.
Point #2: Learn Lua
Great news! Plug-ins for Cosmic Frontier will be able to run Lua scripts. While we don't yet know the full extent of engine functionality exposed to Lua, learning the programming language itself, particularly syntax and the basic computer science concepts it utilizes will always be applicable to whatever the game's Lua API ends up looking like. If you've never learned a computer language before, this may seem like a daunting task. I don't think Lua is a great first language to learn programming in, if I'm being honest. That said, nothing worth doing is easy, so let's dive in together!
Lua.org is your source of all things Lua as you get started. There's a lot of documentation there that will probably be very helpful. In particular, there's a free e-book for Lua 5.0 that will probably be a great method of learning the language in depth in a sensible way. Before you spend any money on a more up-to-date book, it's definitely worth considering free, possibly dated materials instead, as differences from version-to-version of Lua probably aren't going to be that significant, and I don't think we know yet which version of Lua is being embedded into Cosmic Frontier: Override, anyway. The site also includes an up-to-date reference manual for looking things up, and even a web-based Lua interpreter that lets you run Lua code without having to install anything on your computer (try it right now by typing print("Hello world!") and clicking the run button). http://lua-users.org/wiki/LearningLua is another URL that you should probably bookmark, and the same website has a directory of additional resources for learning and getting help with any problems that might come up.
Do you need to become a serious programmer to write a few simple Lua scripts in a plug-in for Cosmic Frontier? Heck no. Go as deep as you want to. Personally, I have a great interest in all things computers, and I probably will learn Lua inside-and-out eventually, but that's just me. Programming may be something you discover you really love when you start learning it, and you may go crazy with it too, but don't feel like you have to. Focus on learning the syntax and basic data types and control structures of the language. Things like expressions and operators, variables and their scopes, loops, and if-then-else statements. My guess is that's all you'll really need to know until Tom Hancocks releases documentation on Cosmic Frontier: Override's Lua API. I expect when Cosmic Frontier comes out, there will be a lot of us sharing scripts with each other that you can learn from, too.
If anyone has a link to any good (free) Lua tutorials that they've used, or are using, I hope they'll comment below.
Point #3: Learn Digital Art
You can make perfectly fine plug-ins for Cosmic Frontier without ever going beyond Point #1, but if you want to start getting into total conversions (TCs), you're going to need to replace just about everything in the existing game scenario, including graphics. You'll also need a lot of new graphics if you do something like expand the existing galaxy with new factions, ships, and outfits. Sure, you can team up with a talented 3D artist in the community, but expect them to be in very high demand, as was the case in the old Escape Velocity modding community. They also probably have their own projects they want to work on. So, with that in mind, maybe you should become a talented 3D artist yourself.
Luckily, there has never been an easier (and cheaper) time learning how to model your own 3D graphics, and create your own 2D art as well. Blender is completely free, cross-platform, and is good enough to create graphics and special effects in even some Hollywood productions and Triple-A games. It's already used by some very talented 3D artists in the Escape Velocity community, and will surely be used in the Cosmic Frontier community for many years to come. I know a few of us would really recommend Blender Guru's free YouTube tutorials. I've also been using a WikiBook and some other channels for reference and help with specific problems. By all means, dig in and find lots of resources for yourself as well. Blender is very popular with tutorial-makers because it's free and lots of students and amateurs use it as their 3D software. Pay close attention to methods. When learning any new art, there's often many different ways of accomplishing the same results. You can often brute force your way into a result that makes your life harder. Experienced 3D artists understand how to do things the easy, efficient ways that save them time and prevent headaches. Professional artists also work as non-destructively as they can, so they can make changes later on without having to start over.
Don't neglect learning 2D art either. Maybe you want to do a plug-in that's got a retro 8-bit look. Maybe you want to create new button graphics, or design a new sidebar interface. Maybe you want to add a fancy government logo on a 3D spaceship, or create a new texture image to apply to a 3D surface. GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) is free, cross-platform, and is very much like Adobe Photoshop and other paid image programs. You may want to invest in some special hardware like a drawing tablet if you really get into 2D art, but if you have an Apple iPad and an Apple Pencil, I highly recommend a program for iOS called Procreate. It's a one-time payment of $9.99, an absolute steal, especially compared to Adobe's expensive subscription model. As it happens, one of the developers is Dafydd "pipeline" Williams of ATMOS fame, a fact I learned after I already fell in love with the app. Procreate is very popular with 2D digital artists and there's no shortage of online tutorials. Pretty much every digital painting artist I've ever seen with a YouTube channel is using Procreate at least some of the time.
Point #4: Learn KDL
Kestrel Development Language is the shiny new way of making plug-ins in the Kestrel Game Engine, which Cosmic Frontier is based on. If you happen to know C++ and can assist with the github project, great, but I'm really just linking to this so you're aware of its existence, and so you can see the documentation and tutorials. Everything is probably still subject to change, but it's not too early to start making yourself aware of KDL.
One really big area that you might be able to make your mark on Cosmic Frontier's modding community is new developer tools. Maybe you want to make the next plug-in editor that everybody uses. Rather than having to deal with the underlying 1s and 0s of resource forks, it will be possible to create tools that generate KDL, which will be much easier to work with, and then let the KDL assembler convert nice happy text files into those resource forks.
I also foresee a type of Cosmic Frontier mod in the future that procedurally generates KDL code, runs it through the assembler, and then creates a fresh new gameplay experience for players each time, whether new mission strings in the same old galaxy, or combined with some kind of fully generated galaxy too.
Some plug-in makers, perhaps you, will find it easier to create your plug-ins with KDL rather than a GUI tool, or automate certain boring plug-in development tasks with a custom script that generates KDL for you, then use a GUI plug-in editor for other stuff. People might share some of these scripts online, and you may want to adapt some for your own particular needs; it'll be helpful to know KDL if you do. If you end up creating Lua scripts in your plug-ins to create new resource types, KDL will be helpful to create the resources of those types, when existing tools don't know what your types even are (although perhaps they'll have a method of importing new definitions).
Everything about this is kind of speculative at this point, but early adopters will have a leg up when Cosmic Frontier: Override is released, and there's a lot of potential in KDL and how future plug-ins will be made.
Point #5: Read a Book
No major plug-in or TC is going to be worth playing if the writing stinks. Are you a good writer? Do you know what good writing is? Maybe, but maybe not. You may be able to simply outsource that work, just like you might be able to outsource the artwork for your plug-in, but chances are the talented writers are going to be busy already, just like the talented artists.
Maybe you can find some education online that'll tell you how to write better, but just as it's helpful to artists to look at good art, it's helpful to writers to read good stories. It's also worth remembering the old adage: good artists copy, great artists steal. There's no new stories, and no new art. Everything's been done before, but you shouldn't just make a cheap copy. Take it, make it yours, and then own it. Be compelling, create surprise through unique (or at least heavily obscured) blending of ancient tropes. Put your own flavor on it.
The more you expose yourself to other people's stories, the better a storyteller you can be yourself, so get out there and read some stories. To be clear, I'm advising you to read, not watch a bunch of scifi movies. Visual storytelling media, like movies, television, or plays, require a different sort of writing. Those stories are told as much through sound, light, and movement that you're just not going to get in a plug-in for a game like Cosmic Frontier. Cosmic Frontier is a bit like an interactive novel, so go and read yourself some novels. It's okay to draw inspiration from television and movies, but learn how to tell those stories through prose, preserving the same sense of tension or excitement in the written word. If you've got a favorite movie that you think would be great to adapt (not by copying, but by stealing) to a plug-in, see if there's a novelization of it you can read. At the very least, track down a copy of the actual script, and read all the description text that the production crew used to design all their sets and lighting and such, and the actors used to get into character.
If you really want to be a great story thief, go off-genre for your inspiration. Cosmic Frontier: Override is obviously a scifi game, set in a scifi universe. That doesn't mean plug-in ideas should be taken solely from the science fiction canon. You can find inspiration from anywhere. A book about pirates or mutineers on the high seas could surely be adapted in a fun way to a science fiction universe, but why not a historical drama set in Elizabethan England, or Revolutionary France? How about an ancient Greek myth or a Japanese folktale? It's Christmas as I'm typing this, so how about taking a story from the Bible? You don't need to write a messiah story (been there, Ory'hara that), but how about Noah and the Flood, or the Tower of Babel? Just read something and get inspired by it. It can be history, it can be fiction, it can be an autobiography. Just read something, learn something, and then use it along with other things to create a story you can own.
Like with watching artists to learn their techniques, think carefully about how the writer is telling their story. How do they emphasize what's important, and what do they leave out that isn't important? How do they describe characters or a scene? Do they tell you, or show you? How does the writer make you feel when they want you to feel something? Is it their word choice, the pattern of their sentences? What is it that makes you excited, or anxious, or relieved? How is the narrative structured? Somebody with talent (hopefully, if you're enjoying it) made a lot of conscious decisions. Unfortunately you can't be over their shoulder as they wrote it all, hearing them explain those decisions sentence-by-sentence, but you have the results in front of you. Try to figure it out.
​
So that's mrxak's Five Point Plan for Cosmic Frontier Modding Preparations in 2021. I hope it's useful, and yes I'm doing all of it myself over the next year, even for the points I'm already quite comfortable with. We can all, always, learn more and get better. I hope at least some of these points make their way into some awesome future Cosmic Frontier plug-ins, or help you complete them. For sure, it'll all be contributing to my own EVN and CFO projects.
​
Bonus 6th Point: Make Friends
Hey, you made it all the way to the end of this long post. Congrats. As your very special reward, here is a 6th point for you, dear Cosmic Frontier plug-in developer. Even in the earliest days of Escape Velocity plug-in making, people were seeking each other out online to talk about it, share information, and increase the knowledge base of the community. Knowledge was scarce, documentation was poor, and people really had to figure stuff out on their own. But when they did, they told others, and the collective body of knowledge increased. Guides were written, dedicated forums were created. It was this that enabled all the great EV/O/N plug-ins you've heard about. It's really the reason why, indirectly, Cosmic Frontier: Override is even getting made. Without a community, we're all poorer for it, so please, if you are interested in plug-in development for Cosmic Frontier, make friends.
A great place to find a community of EV/O/N and CFO plug-in developers is on Discord. The EVN Discord has a bunch of grizzled developers and community members, some of whom date back to the original game like myself. Several plug-ins are under development for EVN and CFO right now, and people talk there about them in channels set aside for that. There's a great art channel, too, for showing off 3D renders, 2D drawings, and discussing some of the software. A couple of us are learning Blender right now, and we talk about it and share tips on that Discord.
Kestrel has its own Discord. Maybe not a great place for discussing plug-ins for Cosmic Frontier, just yet, but there are channels for KDL, the Lua API, and discussion of the Kestrel engine itself. This server is used by the developers of Kestrel and Cosmic Frontier: Override, but please for their sake and ours do a search before you ask them a question. They're busy actually making the game. A lot of your questions have almost certainly been answered, and a lot of the answers are "don't know yet". As more information becomes available, you'll probably see it there first, however. Reading through old discussions in the relevant channels will give you some idea of the potential of these new technologies. There's also a little-used channel specifically for CFO art and another for discussing the base CFO scenario which you may or may not want to expand on with your own plug-ins.
It remains to be seen where the Cosmic Frontier plug-in developer community gathers in force to have specialized and technical discussion of developing plug-ins when the game is released. It may end up here on this subreddit. It may end up on Discord. It may end up on some dedicated website. Right now all I can say for sure is that you're certain to hear about it on at least one of the Discord servers linked above, once people settle down post-release and the community evolves. It'll be good to know those people for getting questions answered, and for collaborative works.
​
Good luck with all your new year's resolutions!

For my personal use I've created a number of mods and am curious what sort of community interest there is, considering some peculiarities and installation difficulties:
Triple-wide and Double-wide UI patches For triple-monitor Surround setups and 32:9 widescreen monitors the UI is terribly stretched horizontally and basically unreadable and unusable.
So I made a mod for triple monitors which centers the usual 16:9 HUD on the center monitor and moves some of the extra HUD elements like quest tracker and notifications off to the left and right monitors to create a cleaner view in the middle. For double-wide monitors, I basically did the same, sticking those extra UI elements to the left and right of the screen.
Problem: if loaded as a custom BA2 it cannot fix the main menu, title screen, in-game help, and other screens that are loaded prior to joining an instance. The full patch can only be installed by creating a custom "SeventySix - Interface.ba2" file. I do this using development tools and a batch file, but don't know if regular players have access to any sort of mod management tool to automate installation into the original game files. The Nexus tool can't. Or would the partial fix of in-game UI only be OK?
Multi-map cycler The in-game map leaves a lot to be desired so there are a lot of custom maps in Nexus, like ones showing resource locations, crafting stations, food, various flux types, etc. But you have to choose just one map replacement.
So I modded the map UI to add a new key to allow you to cycle through a set of multiple maps to see different views. Currently in my game I'm cycling between default, Ultimist's, TZMap, and Mappalachia.
Problem: I can't find any way for the SWF code to check for the existence of a particular texture by name, so the number of maps to cycle between needs to be fixed in the modded SWF. Also, to install it you have to extract the map textures from the other modders' map packs, rename them into a numbered sequence, and build a new BA2 containing the maps you want plus a version of the SWF that counts through the right number. So again, development tools needed to install and use this.
Ultra-high 4K and 8K texture packs The default resolution for most textures is 1024x1024, with 2048x for some ground textures. For 1080p this is fine as pixelization isn't really visible even up close to say wall surfaces, but you probably notice blocky grass and shrubs while sneaking.
So for 4K gaming I made a texture pack that doubles the resolution for "four times sixteen times the detail" at 2048x2048 and 4096x4096 using a combination of AI, hand-editing, and photogrammetry.
Problem: using this texture pack requires around 10GB GPU RAM, and is around 18GB in size even though so far it only covers scenery, buildings, props, and setdressing objects. No clothing or armor or weapons and only a few particular Atom Shop items. Quite a download for questionable payoff as there can be considerable performance impact and doesn't work on many cards.
For 8K gaming I made a texture pack that quadruples the resolution (sixteen times sixteen times the detail) to 4096x4096 and 8192x8192 (the 4K is downscaled from this one). There is virtually no pixelization anywhere even when standing right up against a wall or vendor.
Problem: it utilizes fully 22-23GB GPU RAM on my RTX 3090 and clocks in at around 54GB as a download, again without clothing, armor, or Atom Shop yet being done.
Maybe a categorized set of various texture updates, such as buildings only, scenery only, etc., as an à la carte menu to choose from?
"Gamecube" texture pack 64x64 textures, very low detail and heavily blended to "gameify" the experience. It makes items and enemies easier to distinguish from the background, and gives very high FPS. Probably this increases performance on low-end rigs as well.
Problem: looks terrible for immersion, but the high contrast feels easier to play somehow. Very Nintendo.
"Gameification" glowmaps and meat pile replacement Probably the best feature of this is replacing meat piles with Fasnacht balloons to make it easier to find everything after a slaughter-fest like Line in the Sand. Second-best feature is glowing gore to more easily find bodies in undergrowth. Third-best is all enemies, loot, food, ammo boxes and aid items having a little tinge of a glow to make them stand out and easy to find.
Problem: it sort of feels like playing FarCry Blood Dragon or Duke Nukem. Very Arcade.
Very interested to hear thoughts and suggestions.

Hey. So I started playing NMS with a friend, and after we played for a few hours beyond the tutorial, they asked "so, what can/should I do in this game?" I didn't know where to start, so I figured I'd write a brief (ha) list of things that are worth doing in the game, and a little about how to go about doing them.
Clearly, I got carried away.
This is indeed a list of suggestions, but I guess it also morphed into a mini strat guide as well. I figured I would share the results of my writeup with the NMS reddit. Note that much of this information includes my own opinions, and you will likely disagree with me on some things. I also don't intend to pretend to know everything about the game (I've only played ~400 hours), so absolutely correct me if something I said is incorrect. Also, contribute suggestions of your own! For new(ish) players, there are probably spoilers here for you.
Now... What should you do in NMS? Everything is optional! NMS is a sandbox game so you can choose to do all of the things, some of the things, or none of the things and just veg.
Contents
1.Quests
2.Beef up your freighter, enjoy a little piracy
3.Beef up your multi-tool and/or hunt for another
4.Beef up your starship(s) and/or hunt for more
5.Beef up your exosuit
6.Beef up your exocraft(s)
7.Explore
8.Build a base or a few bases
9.Derelict Freighters (that you can land on)
10.COOK! (Nutrient processor) - sorry, my formatting goes to shit past this point, can't fix it
11.Get a living ship… or two
12.Completionism
13.Misc non-completionist things to “accomplish” or check off before moving on from NMS

1. Quests
   1. “Primary Missions” - quests that reveal plot/things about the NMS universe. These are located at the top of your log (when you press esc and click on “log”)
      1. Atlas Path - following warp paths to find Atlas Interfaces (you haven’t done any of these yet, but it is available to you) to receive lore and blueprints relevant to “completing” the game after finding 10 Atlas Interfaces and then doing something else the game instructs you to do.
      2. Artemis Path - long quest chain that you’ve already started (the game forces you to start when you begin the game, get contacted by Artemis, etc.). Toward the end of this quest chain, the game teaches you the 16 glyphs (one at a time) which are used to activate special portals found on planets that can warp you anywhere in the galaxy. You are given the choice whether or not to “complete” the game at the end of this quest chain.
      3. Space Anomaly (Nexus) visits - your quest log periodically asks that you return to the Space Anomaly to tell Nada and Polo of your progress. They give lore tidbits in response and can give you nanites and quicksilver periodically, I think.
   2. “Secondary Missions” - quests that may or may not reveal lore. Some are more important than others in that some will give you important things that progress you in the game, like blueprints, base building stuff, access to merchant goods. These are located at the bottom of your log.
      1. Quests from the Nexus computer in the Space Anomaly. These give 250 quicksilver (2,500 when the developer decides to resume “weekend missions”), and random other rewards. More involved/tricky to do, can make the game interesting and challenging. Completion of these quests drives the “community research” progress, which unlocks goods that can be purchased by the robot merchant that sells vanity stuff for quicksilver (including the Living Ship Void Egg).
      2. Base Computer Archives - instructions given to you by your base computer(s). Return to them to receive instructions to complete, and then return after at least 2 IRL hours for the next instruction. This chain eventually lets you place stations for your Gek, Vy’keen, and Korvax NPCs who have quests of their own for you and help unlock things for your base. Most or all of the things they reward you can be bought from the base building terminal on the Space Anomaly for salvaged data anyway, but it’s still a fun thing to complete.
      3. Dreams of the Deep - a quest chain that unlocks and activates for you when either of two separate conditions are met, don’t worry about how. The quests involve a set of steps that award you stuff having to do with the nautilon exocraft (the submarine).
      4. Starbirth - after purchasing or otherwise acquiring a void egg, this is the quest chain that you follow to obtain a Living Ship
      5. Quests from space stations. Some you can complete and turn in anywhere, others direct you to specific locations to complete.
2. Beef up your Freighter, enjoy a little space piracy
   1. You can edit the space inside (by the ship command center is the only editable area) by:
      1. Adding/removing walls, hallways, decorative things to make it more visually appealing, etc. You can also add stairs as I believe the game gives you at least 13 huge floors to work with (you just have to clear out the space you want to use, and that takes resources). You can even place your base NPC stations, teleporter, machines, etc and turn it into a mobile base.
      2. Placing storage containers (up to 10) - highly recommended for vast storage that extends anywhere you can have your freighter once the “matter beam” tech is installed
      3. Placing more frigate fleet command rooms
      4. Fly around and shop for more frigates to send on missions for massive rewards and fun mission outcomes (you can command up to 30 frigates)
      5. Install your technologies*** to warp farther and to more stars - I recommend all of these:
      6. ***freighter techs are obtained via the Freighter Research Terminal (located in the round console in your freighter’s captain room). You exchange Salvaged Frigate Modules (SFMs) to “purchase” the blueprints. The fastest way to obtain the SFMs is by PIRACY. NMS is limited with its space combat and piracy options, but you can shoot the pods of NPC freighters and steal their goods without losing reputation with the system’s dominant race. Just be sure to not shoot the pods flying around the freighters, and to not shoot friendly ships. Shooting NPS freighter pods will trigger sentinel ships to enter the area and shoot at you, but you can easily evade them (and the NPC freighter now shooting at you) by flying to a nearby atmosphere, space station, your own freighter, an un-assaulted NPC freighter, Space Anomaly, etc.
      7. Improve the inventory and tech space of your freighter via “Cargo Bulkheads” just like how you did with your starship. These cargo bulkhead items are obtained by finding and exploring derelict freighters, when we haven’t done yet. They can either be found randomly (rarely) by pulsing (spacebar in a ship) or by buying an Emergency Broadcast Receiver for 5,000,000 units from scrap dealers in space stations, or getting one for free once per week from the Helios NPC in the Space Anomaly. Have to use the EBR in space and then pulse to find the derelict freighter. These are kind of difficult and involve shooting creepy alien things in cold corridors of an abandoned freighter.
      8. Place an Orbital Exocraft Materializer in your freighter. This allows you to summon your exocraft (for whatever geobays you have built) on whatever planet within a star system your freighter currently resides.
      9. You could also warp around and look for a different looking freighter and/or one that is a better class, if you don’t like the one you have.
3. Beef up your multi-tool and/or hunt for another
   1. How many do you want to use? You can have up to 3. Some people like to have and switch between 2 or 3, e.g. one for fighting and another for scanning/mining.
      1. Alien - mid mining, high damage, mid-high scanning bonuses
      2. Experimental - mid mining, mid-high damage, high scanning bonuses
      3. Pistol/Rifle (ordinary) - mid mining, low damage, mid scanning bonuses
   2. Install all the tech you want to install on your tool(s). The following are not upgrade modules:
      1. Weapons - note that each weapon has 1 or 2 supporting techs to install that increases their effectiveness. I don’t mention them here, just install the tech(s) that looks like the weapon in your multi-tool. It’s advised to only pick one or two if you only want to use one tool for everything, more if you want a dedicated killing tool.
      2. Mining upgrade techs - all are recommended for dedicated mining/scanning tool
      3. Scanning techs - recommended for dedicated mining/scanning tool
   3. Install all the upgrade Modules - 3 per base tech (scanner, mining beam, each weapon), max. Highly recommended to have the max number of upgrade modules for every tech you feel is important enough to use on a multi-tool.
      1. A, B, C class - automatically sell these
      2. S class - I think it’s worth always checking the mult-tool tech vendor in space stations for S class scanner modules, because the real prize are modules with a “fauna” scanning bonus with as close to the max bonus of +10,000% as you can find. The unit (money) reward for scanning fauna is way higher than flora, so the bonus means a lot more for scanning fauna. Kind of a fun side-RNG game to play.
      3. X-mods, banned/illegal mods, suspicious, or black market mods. All mean the same thing, the mods that are purple-colored and with a big X on the art.These are almost completely random in the number of bonuses they can have, as well as the range of bonuses. The odds of installing one that turns out to be as good or better than S class are VERY low. Still fun to try as long as you have plenty of nanites for your needs. X-mods for the scanner are the most fun IMO because you can install one and get a fauna bonus of up to +11,000%!
   4. Hunting for more
      1. Economy - necessitates the installation of Economy Scanner tech on your ship, shows up when looking at stars in the star map (when preparing to warp) as one of three star indicators. Each level of wealth has 8 different descriptor words (e.g. “failing,” “balanced,” “affluent”).
      2. Location - check the multi-tool cabinet in every system’s space station, Space Anomaly, and any minor settlements you may find on planets/moons. Obviously, wealthy economies have the best chance, so stick to them if you can. Hunting for tools can be a fun thing to do on the side, even if the best tools are not necessary to play the game.
      3. Advanced: there are odd saving/reloading tricks to help you find an S class alien or experimental tool (if you’ve already found an S class cabinet or an A class alien/experimental), the rarest and hardest to find in the game. Look it up if interested.
4. Beef up your starship(s) and/or hunt for more
   1. How many do you want to have/use? You can have up to 6, but know that if you have 6 then you have to scrap one before you can obtain another, so having 6 prevents you from scrapping ships in stations.
      1. Some people like to collect them based on how they look or want one of each type. Picky ship hunting can be fun. Explorer x-wing? Energy ball hauler? Long-nose heavy fighter? Squid exotic?
      2. Some like having even more storage (you can keep items in their inventory while they are parked in your freighter, and you can call them to you on planets).
      3. Some like to have a couple for different functional purposes, e.g. one for fighting, one for warping around, one for flying through black holes and trashing.
   2. Install all the tech you want to install on your ship(s). The following are not upgrade modules:
      1. Weapons - like the multi-tool, note that each weapon has 1 or 2 supporting techs to install that increases their effectiveness. I don’t mention them here, just install the tech(s) that looks like the weapon. It’s advised to only pick a couple (I like photon cannon and positron ejector)
      2. Launch thruster tech - all are recommended for ships you are going to use to land on planets for any reason. Could be any type of ship.
      3. Pulse engine tech - I don’t find the following upgrades to this to be very useful, but good to put in a ship you plan to fly around for exploration purposes I guess. Could be a dedicated explorer / living ship
      4. Shield tech - I’d recommend for all ships
      5. Hyperdrive tech - all are recommended for the ship you are going to do your warping with. Could be a dedicated explorer / living ship, which allow you to warp farther than all other ships if you get S class with good roll.
      6. Other tech
   3. Be selective about upgrade Modules - 6 per base tech (launch thruster, pulse engine, shield, hyperdrive, each weapon), max, with 3 in tech and 3 in general inventory. More of a judgment call as to what you want to max out on number of upgrade modules because you can easily fill up an entire ship’s tech space and general inventory space with tech + modules.
      1. I recommend prioritizing weapon(s) and shield for max (6) modules. 3 for thrusters. 0 for hyperdrive or pulse drive unless dedicated exploration ship.
   4. Hunting for more
      1. Economy - necessitates the installation of Economy Scanner tech on your ship, shows up when looking at stars in the star map (when preparing to warp) as one of three star indicators. Each level of wealth has 8 different descriptor words (e.g. “failing,” “balanced,” “affluent”).
      2. Location - best place to do serious ship hunting is at a trade outpost (use your economy scanner within the utilities UI while in flight) or Colossal Archive buildings (use planetary charts for inhabited outposts) because multiple NPC ships are constantly landing and taking off. You need high refresh rates of ships to make best use of your time, seeing more varieties and better chance at S-class.
      3. Type of ship
5. Beef up your exosuit
   1. Max out the general inventory, tech inventory, and cargo inventory
   2. Install all the tech you want to install. The following are not upgrade modules:
      1. Life Support tech
      2. Hazard Protection tech - I highly recommend all of the following:
      3. Jetpack tech
      4. Other tech
   3. Be selective about upgrade modules. Very similar to the approach to your ship, 6 per base tech (life support, hazard protection, jetpack), max, with 3 in tech and 3 in general inventory. More of a judgment call as to what you want to max out on number of upgrade modules because you can easily fill up an entire tech space and general inventory space with tech + modules.
      1. I recommend prioritizing shield and movement for max (6) modules. Both are extremely useful for survival and basic gameplay. I tend to ignore the life support and elemental protection modules because I am able to simply recharge my protections with plenty of time, given the hazard protection / life support techs. You can easily build in hostile environments while using the build camera (it makes you immune to hazards), and you can be immune to hazards while in (improved) exocraft.
      2. I recommend pursuing the suspicious (X class, black market) hazard protection modules over the standard S-class hazard protection elemental modules. The reason is, each of these give a 1 to 10% resistance to each: heat, cold, radiation, and toxic resistance. This is a really good use of an inventory slot, and reason to seek these out continuously through your play through in an attempt to always find better. And, unlike the S-class hazard protection modules, you don’t have to recharge these.
6. Beef up your exocraft(s)
   1. I won’t go into great detail with these, as much of the exocraft tech and upgrades comes down to personal preference and intended use. I do, however, highly recommend the elemental protection techs for any terrestrial exocraft you may want to use:
      1. Air filtration unit - completely protects you from toxic environments (while you’re in the craft)
      2. Neutron shielding - completely protects you from radioactive environments (while you’re in the craft)
      3. Megawatt heater - completely protects you from cold environments (while you’re in the craft)
      4. Thermal buffer - completely protects you from hot environments (while you’re in the craft)
   2. I recommend the Icarus fuel system, which helpfully replenishes fuel during the day. Like the launch thruster recharger for ships.
   3. If you want a sporty exocraft, definitely check out the vehicle handling upgrade techs and engine & boost upgrade modules. Very useful if you want to cover a lot of ground with your craft, or just have fun jumping it or doing an exocraft track build as a base idea.
7. Explore
   1. There are 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 planets/moons in the game, with a wide range of attributes and features that you have not yet seen. Including the star systems in which they reside. Some really cool/interesting combination possibilities are out there. The vast majority of the stuff in the game has never been seen by another player, even if all of the individual “things” have been found but in different combinations. You can’t visit too many planets or warp too much. You can also stay in one system and really drill down into what it has to offer. There is no wrong way to explore.
   2. As you play around, note planetary size, color(s), biomes, weather, atmosphere, sentinel behavior, flora, fauna, minerals/resources, wateocean, topography, whether inhabited, etc.
      1. Make a list of types of animals, plants, biomes, etc that you like, and go on a pursuit of a planet or moon with that particular combination of things. As an example, an animal type that NMS players often searched for in the past is the memed, rare “diplo” which is effectively a large animal generally shaped like an earth sauropod dinosaur.
   3. Name shit. Sometimes a planet has something wacky or everything is wacky. Name the wacky stuff something fun and upload, in case someone else finds it.
   4. Awiens.
   5. Wander aimlessly, by any means, and look at shit with no particular goal in mind. Lots of people play the game this way to relax and get immersed in a universe that is nothing like the shit reality we currently find ourselves.
   6. Take screen shots. If you see something cool, pretty, interesting, silly, stupid, rare, etc then stop and take a screen shot of it.
   7. Check out other players’ bases. You can see some cool selections via the teleporter in the Space Anomaly. These selections update over time
   8. Stock up on Anomaly Detectors (received by shooting asteroids) and use them to find random weird crap while pulsing in space
8. Build a base or a few bases
   1. Think about what kind of planet you might want to find for a base, and either seek out that planet specifically or keep it in mind during your travels
   2. Slap down a base computer when you find a planet that you want to build a base on, if you don’t feel like building the base right now. Can always delete the base (computer) later, but at least this way the place is marked and you can warp back to it.
   3. Some fun base type/location/functional ideas
      1. Mountaintop
      2. Underwater, in an interesting/deep ocean. There are cool underwater base parts and the nautilon exocraft
      3. Sky base (tricky to do, requires building up from ground then deleting base parts under)
      4. Moon base with a view of the large planet it’s orbiting. Perhaps with rings.
      5. Colorful planet, perhaps with colorful bioluminescence
      6. Bases focused around resource extraction, whatever resource you might want to easily collect to use or sell. Examples of useful resource extraction
      7. Build an exocraft obstacle course or race track. There are actually dedicated base building pieces for this purpose
      8. Beside a game-generated NPC structure, or a rare instance of multiple structures nearby each other
      9. Play around with the more advanced base building doohickies
      10. Build on a fucking terrible planet just because it’s terrible and because you can
      11. AVOID building a base underground, or at least in a volume that requires you to excavate ground to place base objects. (Undisturbed caves are OK.) Ground respawns over time (the exact triggers aren’t fully understood) and you WILL find yourself having to dig out your base again and again. It’s not fun.
   4. There’s a save & reload trick (bug?) that allows you to build, functionally, up to 1,000u away from your base computer. E.g. if you find an EM hotspot to power your base that is 800u away, you can save in your base, reload the game, and stand at the edge of your buildable 300u radius from base computer… and place workable machines. Otherwise, without this trick, things like EM generators will not work. I like to stand at the 300u line and place something basic, like a wood platform, as far as I can in the direction I want to go. Because if I can snap additional platforms to it, I know the trick worked. Once you build out to the spot you need, and confirm that it worked, you can delete the useless base pieces you laid to reach the far-off base location.
9. Derelict Freighters (that you can land on)
   1. As noted before, in the “beefing up your freighter” section, this is worth doing for Cargo Bulkheads. But there are many other rewards to obtain from these and they are worth doing anyway, just for the experience of it. They are found by buying an Emergency Broadcast Receiver (EBR) for 5,000,000 units from scrap dealers in space stations, or getting one for free once per week from the Helios NPC in the Space Anomaly. Have to use the EBR in space and then pulse to find the derelict freighter. These are kind of difficult and involve shooting creepy alien things in cold corridors of an abandoned freighter.
10. COOK! (Nutrient processor, agriculture)
11. There are tons of recipes in the game, and ingredients to gather. One could go on a culinary quest for days. As someone from the NMSResources Facebook page states: “What is the point of doing the cooking?”
12. For fun & also to complete your catalogue
13. Eat for boosts to health, speed, hazard protection, jetpack or other things.
14. Sell for units (amount gets bigger the more complex the item is).
15. Give to Cronus the cook on the Anomaly for Nanites (amount has an element of randomness, but is generally higher the more complex the item is. Giving the same item twice can yield different amounts).
16. Try the automated feeder & livestock unit
17. This system isn’t fully automated. It requires keeping the animals nearby via feeding and keeping the feeder stocked. Some players really don’t like these machines because they are very situational, and oftentimes manual collection of eggs, milk, whatever is more efficient. Results may vary.
18. Get a living ship… or two
19. Obtain a Void Egg from the Quicksilver Synthesis Companion (in the Space Anomaly) for 3,200 quicksilver.
20. Simply having the egg in your inventory causes you to receive a transmission at some point after using the pulse drive or warping, triggering the Starbirth quest line (categorized as a “secondary” mission).
21. The quest line is lengthy and stretched out artificially, with ~20 hour cool down periods between mission steps. It’s not for everyone, but I recommend everyone do it at least once.
22. Completionism - some of these are extreme, but might appeal to you if you like completionism. Warning: most of these are extremely grindy.
23. Complete the “Catalogue” by having all the different things in the following list in your inventory at some point, or learned. I believe the below includes every blueprint, crafting, material tree:
    1. Raw materials - via mining, gathering, etc
    2. Crafted products - via blueprints obtained thru standard gameplay, secured facilities. Farming crops obtained via construction research station in Space Anomaly or from the farmer NPC
    3. Equipment - via blueprints obtained for exosuit, multi-tool, starship, freighter, exocrafts, mostly purchased from the traders in the Space Anomaly for nanites
    4. Constructed technology - via blueprints obtained for base parts, mostly purchased from the Construction Research Station in the Space Anomaly for nanites. Some from the Construction Research Unit
    5. Construction Parts - via blueprints obtained for base parts, mostly purchased from the Construction Research Station in the Space Anomaly for nanites, a lot for quicksilver from the Quicksilver Synthesis Companion NPC (also in the Space Anomaly)
    6. Trade Commodities - mostly vendor trash obtained as rewards or purchasable from trade terminals or NPCs. Some items are ingredients for construction
    7. Curiosities discovered - mostly items obtained thru standard gameplay, quest completion, and gathering
    8. Cooking products - obtained via gathering, killing fauna, made via the nutrient processor
    9. Portal glyphs (16) discovered - via traveler NPCs or completing the Artemis quest line
24. Complete the “Milestones” by maxing out all the following:
    1. Journey Milestones
    2. Lifeforms
    3. Guilds
25. “Complete” the “Log.” I mean completing all the standard primary and secondary quests, excluding the quests that are endlessly supplied such as the proc generated station/anomaly quests. Completing the primary quests involves “completing” the game/story line, and probably more than once given that there is more than one way to “complete” the game. I’m not going to tell you what this means because that’s a spoiler.
26. Complete learning the three alien race languages and all the Atlas words. This goes beyond the “Milestones requirement,” as the wiki states there are 2,368 words to learn in the game
27. Reputation: max with the three alien races and the three guilds
28. Complete all the achievements for the game system of your choice (Xbox One, PS4, Steam, whatever).
29. Hit the unit cap of 4,294,967,295 without cheating.
30. Legitimately find one of everything as S-class, on your own (i.e. no coordinates from other players, no editing, no gifts)
31. Multi-tool - perhaps one of each? (alien, experimental, and “ordinary”)
32. Ships - perhaps one of each? (shuttle, fighter, explorer, hauler, exotic, living)
33. Freighter
34. All upgrade modules S or better (great X rolls)
35. All 30 frigates (fully upgraded through play, let’s be realistic)
36. Misc non-completionist things to “accomplish” or consider checking off before moving on from NMS
37. Be satisfied with your base(s)
38. Be satisfied with your collection of multi-tool(s) & ship(s), freighter & frigates, exosuit…including all the tech installed, class, upgrades and quality of upgrade modules
39. Be satisfied with all the exploration you’ve done and confident that you’ve seen most of what there is to see in one form or another. Including the variety of … galaxies.
40. Be satisfied with the extent of your purchases with quicksilver from the Quicksilver Synthesis Companion in the Space Anomaly
41. Understand/go through the plot of the game, the lore/back-story
42. Try all the different exocrafts
43. Try all the different multi-tool and ship weapons
44. Feed and ride alien animals!
45. Consider building a base in a more populated area. There are active communities who mass-build together in systems, and the next-gen base expansion options will probably make this more fun.
46. Try the Bytebeat stuff. It really is fun.
47. Share coordinates for things you find that are rare or interesting. There are a few options: 1. NMSCoordinateExchange/ 2. https://www.nmsce.com/nmsce.html 3. https://www.nmseeds.club/ for if you play PC and want to try out the save editor. Be very careful with it... it's tempting to edit everything but that flat out ruins the game. Editing seeds and sharing seeds you find can be fun, but resist temptation! 4. There are more places that share info

First of all, welcome to the Shortcuts community! We’re thrilled that you’re getting into this amazingly powerful iOS app. With the launch of iOS 14 and the attention that themes using Widgetsmith and Shortcuts have gotten on TikTok and other platforms, it’s a very exciting time for Shortcuts.
That said, there are a few things that I would like to clear up.

1. The search bar is your friend. The first thing you should try, of course, is to figure things out yourself. If you don’t figure it out, then the first thing you do should not be to make a post about it. Instead, please please PLEASE search the subreddit to see if your question (or a similar one) has been answered before. Nine times out of ten, it already has been answered. If you don’t find your question with a search, then try rewording your search a few times to see if you can find anything. If you can’t find anything on this subreddit, try a Google search. If nothing comes up with either of those, then and only then should you post your question.
2. Please be respectful. Do not make posts with titles in all caps because IT COMES ACROSS AS YOU YELLING AT US. We are not employees; we are users and enthusiasts who (mostly) do this for free. We are volunteering our time to help you, so please be respectful of others and understand that we may not be able to help you right away, or even at all if your question has a simple answer of “not possible.”
3. We are not Apple. We are the volunteer community. If you have a bug report, you can send it to Apple through the Feedback app. This app is normally hidden, but you can open it with this shortcut: https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/55c5a6b05a64477c8cadebe7c190037d
4. iOSsetups exists for you to show off your home screen themes.
5. Please do not ask questions that are in the FAQ list below. This goes back to item 1, about searching before asking, but I will put some of the most frequently asked ones here. Also check out the Frequently Requested Shortcuts Repository and the List of helpful links for shortcuts information.

Q: How do I make a custom icon for an app?
A: Create a shortcut with one action: “Open App.” Select the app you want in that action. Then tap on the three dots in the upper right corner of the editor view and tap “Add to Home Screen.” You can give the icon any name you want and choose a custom image to use as the icon by tapping the icon next to the field where you can edit the name. Now tap “Add” and it will be on your home screen. Be sure not to rename or delete the shortcut as long as the icon is on your home screen, because that will break the icon.
A good resource for making icon themes is https://iskin.tooliphone.net.
Q: How do I make a transparent icon?
A: You can't. The best you can do is to make an icon that blends in perfectly with your wallpaper.
Q: How do I make a shortcut to change my wallpaper?
A: Not possible. Apple removed the Set Wallpaper action in the early betas of iOS 13 and has not reinstated it since then.
Q: How can I make an Open App shortcut on the home screen not open the Shortcuts app before opening the app I want?
A: If you use a shortcut through a home screen icon, this isn’t possible to bypass. If you don’t care about the icon, you can run a shortcut through a home screen widget. If you want a smoother experience when using custom icons, one that doesn’t use a shortcut to launch an app, check out the shortcut in this post: https://www.reddit.com/shortcuts/comments/ix5wp1/icon_themer_custom_home_screen_app_icons_that/
Q: How do I get a custom app icon to show the red notification badge for that app?
A: You can’t, unless you jailbreak. Only with a jailbreak can you actually change the icon for an app, and then you would use the SnowBoard or Anemone tweaks rather than a shortcut.
Q: How do I make my phone play a sound when I plug it in?
A: See this excellent post: https://www.reddit.com/shortcuts/comments/iwmifg/beginners_guide_on_playing_a_custom_sound_when/
Q: When I tap the three dots, it opens the shortcut and shows me the actions instead of doing anything! Help!
A: That's not how you run a shortcut. To run a shortcut from the library view, which shows all of your shortcuts as colored tiles, tap anywhere on the tile except the three dots to run it. If you're in the editor view, where all the actions are visible, tap on the triangular blue "run"/"play" button in the lower right corner.
Q: Where do you guys share shortcuts?
A: https://routinehub.co is the main shortcut-sharing website that we use.
Q: How do I enable untrusted shortcuts?
A: Create a shortcut and add one “Nothing” action to it. Run the shortcut. Then go into the Settings app and go to the Shortcuts page. Enable “Allow Untrusted Shortcuts.” Now you should be able to install any shortcut from another user.
Q: Why isn't the Speak Text or Play Sound action working in my automation?
A: Several users have reported this same issue. For Speak Text, try going to Settings -> Accessibility -> Spoken Content -> Voices and making sure that the voice you're using in Speak Text is in fact installed on your device. For Play Sound...if it's giving you a problem, then that's definitely a bug. Hopefully it's fixed soon.
Q: How do I set up a shortcut/automation to run with a trigger?
A: First of all, personal automations are separate from shortcuts, and triggers are not actions you can add to a shortcut. Second of all, you can set this up by going to the center tab at the bottom of the Shortcuts app. Tap “Create new personal automation.” You will then be presented with a list of triggers to choose from. Select a trigger, and then tap “next” to add actions to your automation. If you want to run a shortcut in your library using this trigger, add a “Run Shortcut” action and select your shortcut in the “Shortcut” field.
Q: How do I make an automation run only when multiple conditions are met?
A: You can’t. An automation can only have one trigger. However, you can add actions to the automation to determine whether anything should happen based on another condition. One of the most common “second conditions” is time.
Q: How do I make my automation run without tapping on a notification to confirm?
A: That depends on the automation trigger. If you’re using one of these triggers, there will be a switch to turn off “Ask Before Running” in the automation settings:

• Time of day (iOS 14)
• Alarm
• Sleep (iOS 14)
• Workout (iOS 14)
• CarPlay
• Airplane Mode
• NFC
• DND
• Low Power Mode
• Open App
• Close App (iOS 14)
• Battery level (iOS 14)
• Charger (iOS 14)

All other triggers require you to tap on the notification to run their automations. That includes Bluetooth, which is useful for things like “do something when my phone connects to my AirPods,” and email/message triggers. You will have to confirm those.
The only way around those automations that still require confirmation is to jailbreak your phone and install a tweak called TrueCuts or TruestCuts. This enables the “Ask Before Running” switch for all automations, not just the ones I listed above.
Q: Why can’t I use iCloud Drive in shortcuts on my Apple Watch?
A: This is a known bug. Nothing you can really do about it right now.
Q: Why can't I move a file into the iCloud Drive/Shortcuts/ folder?
A: Several users have reported the same bug. For now, you have two options:

1. Move the file into the Shortcuts folder on another device--whether that be on a Mac through Finder, on Windows through the iCloud section of File Explorer, or in your browser through the web version of iCloud.
2. Use a shortcut like this to copy the file to the folder:

``` Get File (show document picker: yes)
Save File (ask where to save: no) ```
Q: How do I run a shortcut based on a HomeKit trigger?
A: https://pushcut.io
Q: Why do I keep seeing popups asking me to run actions?
A: Go into the shortcut and look for a toggle on the offending action called “Show When Run.” Turn that off, if it’s there.
Q: I’m trying to make a shortcut for an app, but it’s not showing up in the Apps list.
A: That’s because it doesn’t have any actions for Shortcuts. But if you want to make a shortcut to open the app, then you’re in the wrong place. Search for the action called “Open App.” (Not “Open In…”) This will let you open any app on your device.
Q: How do I make a shortcut to open a folder of apps on my home screen?
A: A shortcut cannot navigate within your home screen. Fancy Folder Maker is what you’re looking for. It creates a shortcut with a menu of apps, as a substitute for an actual app folder.
Q: How do I make a shortcut to go to a page on my home screen or the App Library?
A: You can't. There is no URL scheme or other integration that would make this possible currently.
Q: Are Widgetsmith and that custom icon creator that uses scary Profiles safe?
A: Yes. Widgetsmith is by a very respected developer on the App Store, and I’ve looked through Icon Themer and can confirm that there is nothing malicious or data-collecting in that shortcut.
Q: I want to download videos or images from a site like Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, etc.
A: This post gives some excellent recommendations for downloader shortcuts, as well as how to tie them together: https://www.reddit.com/shortcuts/comments/iwhqc8/tutorial_shortcut_create_your_allinone_downloade
Q: How can I simulate a screen tap?
A: Shortcuts can’t simulate screen taps unless you use a combination of Voice Control and Speak Text (to call out the commands). If you’re trying to do something within an app but don’t know how to do it, there are generally three ways to do it:

• The app donates actions to Shortcuts, either directly or through Siri suggestions. (For some apps, the actions are actually built directly into the Shortcuts app.)
• The app has an X-callback URL scheme that you can use with the Open URL or Open X-Callback URL actions to perform actions in the app. (This method predates Shortcuts.)
• The app is for a service that has a web API that you can use directly through Get Contents of URL instead of going through the app. Some APIs can be used through the Shortcutify app’s actions, while you can find shortcuts on this subreddit and on RoutineHub for other APIs. If an API hasn’t been used before as far as you know, then you can search online for documentation and try to figure it out yourself. If you get stuck, then that would be a good thing to make a post about.

If none of those options are available, then you might want to consider the Voice Control method, but only as a last resort.
Q: How do I do something with Spotify?
A: Check out Shortcutify or the Ultimate Spotify Shortcut.
Edit: for some actions, you can also do this: https://reddit.com/shortcuts/comments/ix9c41/_/gg4ph7z/?context=1
Q: I don’t think my question has been asked before, can I ask it?
A: Sure! The purpose of this post is just to (hopefully) stem the tide of nonstop duplicate posts. We’ll be more than happy to answer your question. If it has been answered before, and it’s not covered in this post or the other two FAQ posts linked here, we’ll be sure to link you to the old post.
Again, welcome to the Shortcuts community! Enjoy!

Hi sysadmin,
It's been 6 months since we launched the full list on our website. We decided to celebrate with a mega list of the items we've featured since then, broken down by category. Enjoy!
To make sure I'm following the rules of rsysadmin, rather than link directly to our website for sign up for the weekly email I'm experimenting with reddit ads so:
You can sign up to get this in your inbox each week (with extras) by following this link.
** We're looking for tips from IT Pros, SysAdmins and MSPs in IT Pro Tuesday. This could be command line, shortcuts, process, security or whatever else makes you more effective at doing your job. Please leave a comment with your favorite tip(s), and we'll feature them over the following weeks.
Now on with the tools... As always, EveryCloud has no known affiliation with any of these unless we explicitly state otherwise.
Free Tools
Pageant is an SSH authentication agent that makes it easier to connect to Unix or Linux machines via PuTTY. Appreciated by plazman30 who says, "It took me WAY TOO LONG to discover this one. Pageant is a component of Putty. It sits in your system tray and will let you load SSH keys into it and pass them through to putty, WinSCP, and number of other apps that support it."
NCurses Disk Usage is a disk usage analyzer with an ncurses interface. It is fast, simple and easy and should run in any minimal POSIX-like environment with ncurses installed. Recommended by durgadas as "something I install on all my Linuxes... Makes finding out sizes semi-graphical, [with] super easy nav. Good for places without monitoring—lightweight and fast; works on nearly all flavors of Unix I've needed."
AutoHotkey is an open-source scripting language for Windows that helps you easily create small to complex scripts for all sorts of tasks (form fillers, auto-clicking, macros, etc.) Automate any desktop task with this small, fast tool that runs out-of-the-box. Recommended by plazman30 as a "pretty robust Windows scripting language. I use it mostly for on-the-fly pattern substitution. It's nice to be able to type 'bl1' and have it auto-replace it my bridge line phone number."
PingInfoView lets you easily ping multiple host names and IP addresses, with the results compiled in a single table. Automatically pings all hosts at the interval you specify, and displays the number of successful and failed pings, as well as average ping time. Results can be saved as a text/html/xml file or copied to the clipboard. Thanks go to sliced_BR3AD for this one.
DriveDroid simulates a USB thumbdrive or CD-drive via the mass storage capabilities in the Android/Linux kernel. Any ISO/IMG files on the phone can be exposed to a PC, as well as any other USB thumbdrive capabilities, including booting from the drive. Can be a quick and easy option for OS installations, rescues or occasions when it helps to have a portable OS handy. Suggested by codywarmbo, who likes it because of the ability to "Boot a PC using ISO files stored on your Android phone... Having a 256GB SD full of any OS you want is super handy!"
FreeIPA is an integrated identity and authentication solution for Linux/UNIX networked environments. It combines Linux (Fedora), 389 Directory Server, MIT Kerberos, NTP, DNS and Dogtag (Certificate System). Provides centralized authentication, authorization and account information by storing data about user, groups, hosts and other objects necessary to manage the security of a network. Thanks to skarsol, who recommends it as an open-source solution for cross-system, cross-platform, multi-user authentication.
PCmover Profile Migrator migrates applications, files and settings between any two user profiles on the same computer to help set up PCs with O365 Business. User profile apps, data and settings are quickly and easily transferred from the old local AD users to new Azure AD users. Can be good for migrating data from a user profile associated with a former domain to a new profile on a new domain. Suggested by a_pojke, who found it useful "to help migrate profiles to 0365/AAD; it's been a life saver with some recent onboards."
GNU Guix is a Linux package manager that is based on the Nix package manager, with Guile Scheme APIs. It is an advanced distribution of the GNU OS that specializes in providing exclusively free software. Supports transactional upgrades and roll-backs, unprivileged package management and more. When used as a standalone distribution, Guix supports declarative system configuration for transparent and reproducible operating systems. Comes with thousands of packages, which include applications, system tools, documentation, fonts and more. Recommended by necrophcodr.
Attack Surface Analyzer 2.0 is the latest version of the MS tool for taking a snapshot of your system state before and after installation of software. It displays changes to key elements of the system attack surface so you can view changes resulting from the introduction of the new code. This updated version is a rewrite of the classic 1.0 version from 2012, which covered older versions of Windows. It is available for download or as source code on Github. Credit for alerting us to this one goes to Kent Chen.
Process Hacker is an open-source process viewer that can help with debugging, malware detection, analyzing software and system monitoring. Features include: a clear overview of running processes and resource usage, detailed system information and graphs, viewing and editing services and more. Recommended by k3nnyfr, who likes it as a "ProcessExplorer alternative, good for debugging SRP and AppLocker issues."
Q-Dir (the Quad Explorer) provides quick, simple access to hard disks, network folders, USB-sticks, floppy disks and other storage devices. Includes both 32-bit and 64-bit versions, and the correct one is used automatically. This tool has found a fan in user_none, who raves, "Q-Dir is awesome! I searched high and low for a good, multi-pane Explorer replacement that didn't have a whole bunch of junk, and Q-Dir is it. Fantastic bit of software."
iftop is a command-line system monitor tool that lets you display bandwidth usage on an interface. It produces a frequently updated list of network connections, ordered according to bandwidth usage—which can help in identifying the cause of some network slowdowns. Appreciated by zorinlynx, who likes that it "[l]ets you watch a network interface and see the largest flows. Good way to find out what's using up all your bandwidth."
Delprof2 is a command-line-based application for deleting user profiles in a local or remote Windows computer according to the criteria you set. Designed to be easy to use with even very basic command-line skills. This one is thanks to Evelen1, who says, "I use this when computers have problems due to profiles taking up all the hard drive space."
MSYS2 is a Windows software distribution and building platform. This independent rewrite of MSYS, based on modern Cygwin (POSIX compatibility layer) and MinGW-w64, aims for better interoperability with native Windows software. It includes a bash shell, Autotools, revision control systems and more for building native Windows applications using MinGW-w64 toolchains. The package management system provides easy installation. Thanks for this one go to Anonymouspock, who says, "It's a mingw environment with the Arch Linux pacman package manager. I use it for ssh'ing into things, which it does very well since it has a proper VT220 compatible terminal with an excellent developer."
FastCopy is the fastest copy/backup software for Windows. Supports UNICODE and over MAX_PATH (260 characters) file pathnames. Uses multi-threads to bring out the best speed of devices and doesn't hog resources, because MFC is not used. Recommended by DoTheEvolution as the "fastest, comfiest copy I ever used. [I]t behaves just like I want, won't shit itself on trying to read damaged hdd, long paths are no problem, logs stuff, can shutdown after done, got it integrated into portable totalcommander."
Baby Web Server is an alternative for Microsoft's IIS. This simple web server offers support for ASP, with extremely simple setup. The server is multi threaded, features a real-time server log and allows you to configure a directory for webpages and default HTML page. Offers support for GET, POST and HEAD methods (form processing); sends directory listing if default HTML is not found in directory; native ASP, cookie and SSI support; and statistics on total connections, successful and failed requests and more. Limited to 5 simultaneous connections. FatherPrax tells us it's "[g]reat for when you're having to update esoteric firmware at client sites."
Bping is a Windows ping alternative that beeps whenever a reply comes in. Can allow you to keep track of your pings without having to watch the monitor. According to the recommendation from bcahill, "you can set it to beep on ping reply or on ping failure (default). I love it because if I'm wanting to monitor when a server goes up or down, I can leave it running in the background and I'll know the instant the status changes."
LDAPExplorerTool is a multi-platform graphical LDAP browser and tool for browsing, modifying and managing LDAP servers. Tested for Windows and Linux (Debian, Red Hat, Mandriva). Features SSL/TLS & full UNICODE support, the ability to create/edit/remove LDAP objects and multivalue support (including edition). Endorsed by TotallyNotIT... "Holy hell, that thing is useful."
MxToolbox is a tool that lists the MX records for a domain in priority order. Changes to MX Records show up instantly because the MX lookup is done directly against the domain's authoritative name server. Diagnostics connects to the mail server, verifies reverse DNS records, performs a simple Open Relay check and measures response time performance. Also lets you check each MX record (IP Address) against 105 blacklists. Razorray21 tells us it's an "excellent site for troubleshooting public DNS issues."
Proxmox Virtual Environment is a Debian-based Linux distribution with a modified Ubuntu LTS kernel that allows deployment and management of virtual machines and containers. Suggested by -quakeguy-, who says, "Proxmox is totally killer, particularly if you don't want to spend a ton of money and like ZFS."
Multi Commander is a multi-tabbed file manager that is an alternative to Windows Explorer. It has all the standard features of a file manager plus more-advanced features, like auto-unpacking; auto-sorting; editing the Windows Registry and accessing FTP; searching for and viewing files and pictures. Includes built-in scripting support. Reverent tells us "What I love about Multicommander is that it basically acts as a launcher for all my tools. Documents automatically open up in my preferred editor (vscode), compressed files automatically open up in 7-zip, I have a ton of custom shortcuts bound to hotkeys, and it has a bunch of built-in tools. I can even do cool things like open up consolez in the focused directory and choose to open CMD, Powershell, or Powershell 6 (portable) and whether it runs as admin or not. Oh yeah, and it's all portable. It and all the tool dependencies run off the USB."
Apache Guacamole is a remote desktop gateway that supports standard protocols like VNC, RDP and SSH. The client is an HTML5 web app that requires no plugins or client software. Once installed on a server, desktops are accessible from anywhere via web browser. Both the Guacamole server and a desktop OS can be hosted in the cloud, so desktops can be virtual. Built on its own stack of core APIs, Guacamole can be tightly integrated into other applications. "Fir3start3r likes it because it "will allow you to RDP/VNC/TELNET/SSH to any device that it can reach via a web browser....you can set up folders/subfolders for groups of devices to keep things organized - love it!!"
ShowKeyPlus is a simple Windows product key finder and validation checker for Windows 7, 8 and 10. Displays the key and its associated edition of Windows. Thanks to k3nnyfr for the recommendation.
Netdisco is a web-based network management tool that collects IP and MAC address data in a PostgreSQL database using SNMP, CLI or device APIs. It is easy to install and works on any Linux or Unix system (docker images also available). Includes a lightweight web server interface, a backend daemon to gather network data and a command-line interface for troubleshooting. Lets you turn off a switch port or change the VLAN or PoE status of a port and inventory your network by model, vendor, and software. Suggested by TheDraimen, who loves "being able to punch in a MAC and find what port it is plugged into or run an inventory on a range of IPs to find unused in static range..."
NetBox is an open-source web application that helps manage and document networks. Addresses IP address management (IPAM); organizing equipment racks by group and site; tracking types of devices and where they are installed; network, console, and power connections among devices; virtual machines and clusters; long-haul communications circuits and providers; and encrypted storage of sensitive credentials. Thanks to ollybee for the suggestion.
Elasticsearch Security. The core security features of the Elastic Stack are now available for free, including encrypting network traffic, creating and managing users, defining roles that protect index and cluster level access, and fully secure Kibana with Spaces (see the linked blog post for more info). Thanks to almathden for bringing this great news to our attention.
BornToBeRoot NETworkManager is a tool for managing and troubleshooting networks. Features include a dashboard, network interface, IP scanner, port scanner, ping, traceroute, DNS lookup, remote desktop, PowerShell (requires Windows 10), PuTTY (requires PuTTY), TigerVNC (requires TigerVNC), SNMP - Get, Walk, Set (v1, v2c, v3), wake on LAN, HTTP headers, whois, subnet calculator, OUI/port lookup, connections, listeners and ARP table. Suggested by TheZNerd, who finds it "nice [for] when I calculate subnet up ranges for building SCCM implementations for my clients."
Awesome Selfhosted is a list of free software network services and web applications that can be self hosted—instead of renting from SaaS providers. Example list categories include: Analytics, Archiving and Digital Preservation, Automation, Blogging Platforms ...and that's just the tip of the iceberg!
Rclone is a command-line program for syncing files and directories to/from many platforms. Features include MD5/SHA1 hash checking for file integrity; file timestamp preservation; partial-sync support on a whole-file basis; ability to copy only new/changed files; one-way sync; check mode; network sync; backend encryption, cache and union; and optional FUSE mount. Recommended by wombat-twist because it supports "many cloud/traditional storage platforms."
Freeware Utilities for Windows can be found in this rather long list. Tools are organized by category: password recovery, network monitoring, web browser, video/audio related, internet related, desktop, Outlook/Office, programmer, disk, system and other. Appreciation to Adolfrian for the recommendation.
Checkmk is a comprehensive solution for monitoring of applications, servers, and networks that leverages more than 1700 integrated plug-ins. Features include hardware & software inventory; an event console; analysis of SysLog, SNMP traps and log files; business intelligence; and a simple, graphical visualization of time-series metrics data. Comes in both a 100% open-source edition and an Enterprise Edition with a high-performance core and additional features and support. Kindly suggested by Kryp2nitE.
restic is a backup program focused on simplicity—so it's more likely those planned backups actually happen. Easy to both configure and use, fast and verifiable. Uses cryptography to guarantee confidentiality and integrity of the data. Assumes backup data is stored in an untrusted environment, so it encrypts your data with AES-256 in counter mode and authenticates using Poly1305-AES. Additional snapshots only take the storage of the actual increment and duplicate data is de-duplicated before it is written to the storage backend to save space. Recommended by shiitakeshitblaster who says, "I'm loving it! Wonderful cli interface and easy to configure and script."
DPC Latency Checker is a Windows tool for analyzing a computer system's ability to correctly handle real-time data streams. It can help identify the cause of drop-outs—the interruptions in real-time audio and video streams. Supports Windows 7, Windows 7 x64, Windows Vista, Windows Vista x64, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2003 x64, Windows XP, Windows XP x64, Windows 2000. DoTheEvolution recommends it as a preferable way to check system latency, because otherwise you usually "just start to disconnect shit while checking it."
TLDR (too long; didn’t read) pages is a community-driven repository for simplifying man pages with practical examples. This growing collection includes examples for all the most-common commands in UNIX, Linux, macOS, SunOS and Windows. Our appreciation goes to thblckjkr for the suggestion.
Network Analyzer Pro helps diagnose problems in your wifi network setup or internet connection and detects issues on remote servers. Its high-performance wifi device discovery tool provides all LAN device addresses, manufacturers and names along with the BonjouDLNA services they provide. Shows neighboring wi-fi networks and signal strength, encryption and router manufacturer that can help with finding the best channel for a wireless router. Everything works with IPv4 and IPv6. Caleo recommends it because it "does everything Advanced IP scanner does and more—including detailed network information, speed testing, upnp/bonjour service scans, port scans, whois, dns record lookup, tracert, etc."
SmokePing is an open-source tool for monitoring network latency. Features best-of-breed latency visualization, an interactive graph explorer, a wide range of latency measurement plugins, a masteslave system for distributed measurement, a highly configurable alerting system and live latency charts. Kindly suggested by freealans.
Prometheus is an open source tool for event monitoring and alerting. It features a multi-dimensional data model with time series data identified by metric name and key/value pairs, a flexible query language, no reliance on distributed storage (single server nodes are autonomous), time series collection via a pull model over HTTP, pushing time series supported via an intermediary gateway, targets discovered via service discovery or static configuration, and multiple modes of graphing and dashboarding support. Recommended by therealskoopy as a "more advanced open source monitoring system" than Zabbix.
MediCat is bootable troubleshooting environment that continues where Hiren's Boot CD/DVD left off. It provides a simplified menu system full of useful PC tools that is easy to navigate. It comes in four versions:

• MediCat DVD—PortableApps Suite, Linux boot environments and a full mini Windows 10 WinPE Boot Environment
• MediaCat DVD Naked—Linux boot environments and a full mini Windows 10 WinPE Boot Environment
• Mini Windows 10 x64—Windows 10 WinPE Boot Environment and PortableApps Suite
• Mini Windows 10 x64 Naked—Windows 10 WinPE Boot Environment

Recommended by reloadz400, who adds that it has a "large footprint (18GB), but who doesn't have 32GB and larger USB sticks laying everywhere?"
PRTG monitors all the systems, devices, traffic and applications in your IT infrastructure—traffic, packets, applications, bandwidth, cloud services, databases, virtual environments, uptime, ports, IPs, hardware, security, web services, disk usage, physical environments and IoT devices. Supports SNMP (all versions), Flow technologies (NetFlow, jFlow, sFlow), SSH, WMI, Ping, and SQL. Powerful API (Python, EXE, DLL, PowerShell, VB, Batch Scripting, REST) to integrate everything else. While the unlimited version is free for 30 days, stillchangingtapes tells us it remains "free for up to 100 sensors."
NetworkMiner is a popular open-source network forensic analysis tool with an intuitive user interface. It can be used as a passive network sniffepacket capturing tool for detecting operating systems, sessions, hostnames, open ports and the like without putting traffic on the network. It can also parse PCAP files for off-line analysis and to regenerate/reassemble transmitted files and certificates from PCAP files. Credit for this one goes to Quazmoz.
PingCastle is a Windows tool for auditing the risk level of your AD infrastructure and identifying vulnerable practices. The free version provides the following reports: Health Check, Map, Overview and Management. Recommended by L3T, who cheerfully adds, "Be prepared for the best free tool ever."
Jenkins is an open-source automation server, with hundreds of plugins to support project building, deployment and automation. This extensible automation server can be used as a simple CI server or turned into a continuous delivery hub. Can distribute work across multiple machines, with easy setup and configuration via web interface. Integrates with virtually any tool in the continuous integration/delivery toolchain. It is self-contained, Java-based and ready to run out-of-the-box. Includes packages for Windows, Mac OS X and other Unix-like operating systems. A shout out to wtfpwndd for the recommendation.
iPerf3 provides active measurements of the maximum achievable bandwidth on IP networks. Reports the bandwidth, loss and other parameters. Lets you tune various parameters related to timing, buffers and protocols (TCP, UDP, SCTP with IPv4 and IPv6). Be aware this newer implementation shares no code with the original iPerf and is not backwards compatible. Credit for this one goes to Moubai.
LatencyMon analyzes the possible causes of buffer underruns by measuring kernel timer latencies and reporting DPC/ISR excecution times and hard pagefaults. It provides a comprehensible report and identifies the kernel modules and processes behind audio latencies that result in drop outs. It also provides the functionality of an ISR monitor, DPC monitor and a hard pagefault monitor. Requires Windows Vista or later. Appreciation to aberugg who tells us, "LatencyMon will check all sorts of info down to what driveprocess might be the culprit. It will help you narrow it down even more. This tool helped me realize that Windows 10's kernel is terrible in terms of device latency when compared to previous versions."
GNU parallel is a shell tool for executing jobs—like a single command or a small script that has to be run for each of the lines in the input—in parallel on one or more computers. Typical input is a list of files, hosts, users, URLs or tables. A job can also be a command that reads from a pipe, which can then be split and piped into commands in parallel. Velenux finds it "handy to split jobs when you have many cores to use."
Kanboard is open-source project management software that features a simple, intuitive user interface, a clear overview of your tasks—with search and filtering, drag and drop, automatic actions and subtasks, attachments and comments. Thanks go to sgcdialler for this one!
Monosnap is a cross-platform screenshot utility with some nice features. Suggested by durgadas, who likes it because it "has a built-in editor for arrows and blurring and text and can save to custom locations—like Dropbox or multiple cloud services, including it's own service, Amazon S3, FTP, SFTP, Box, Dropbox, Google Drive, Yandex, Evernote... Video and gaming screen capture also, shrink Retina screenshot preference, etc, etc... Every feature I've ever wanted in a screenshot utility is there."
Advanced Port Scanner is a network scanner with a user-friendly interface and some nice features. Helps you quickly find open ports on network computers and retrieve versions of programs running on those ports. Recommended by DarkAlman, who sees it as the "same as [Advanced IP Scanner], but for active ports."
Spiceworks Network Monitor and Helpdesk allows you to launch a fully-loaded help desk in minutes. This all-in-one solution includes inventory, network monitor and helpdesk.
Microsoft Safety Scanner helps you find and remove malware from computers running Windows 10, Windows 10 Tech Preview, Windows 8.1, Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Server 2016, Windows Server Tech Preview, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2008 R2, or Windows Server 2008. Only scans when manually triggered, and it is recommended you download a new version prior to each scan to make sure it is updated for the latest threats.
CLCL is a free, clipboard caching utility that supports all clipboard formats. Features a customizable menu. According to JediMasterSeamus, this clipboard manager "saves so much time. And you can save templates for quick responses or frequently typed stuff."
Desktop Info displays system information on your desktop, like wallpaper, but stays in memory and updates in real time. Can be great for walk-by monitoring. Recommended by w1llynilly, who says, "It has 2 pages by default for metrics about the OS and the network/hardware. It is very lightweight and was recommended to me when I was looking for BGInfo alternatives."
True Ping is exactly the same as the standard ping program of Windows 9x, NT and 2000—except that it does a better job calculating the timing. It uses a random buffer (that changes at every ping) to improve performance. Thanks to bcahill for this one, who says, it "... can send pings very fast (hundreds per second). This is very helpful when trying to diagnose packet loss. It very quickly shows if packet loss is occurring, so I can make changes and quickly see the effect."
Parted Magic is a hard disk management solution that includes tools for disk partitioning and cloning, data rescue, disk erasing and benchmarking with Bonnie++, IOzone, Hard Info, System Stability Tester, mprime and stress. This standalone Linux operating system runs from a CD or USB drive, so nothing need be installed on the target machine. Recommended by Aggietallboy.
mbuffer is a tool for buffering data streams that offers direct support for TCP-based network targets (IPv4 and IPv6), the ability to send to multiple targets in parallel and support for multiple volumes. It features I/O rate limitation, high-/low-watermark-based restart criteria, configurable buffer size and on-the-fly MD5 hash calculation in an efficient, multi-threaded implementation. Can help extend drive motor life by avoiding buffer underruns when writing to fast tape drives or libraries (those drives tend to stop and rewind in such cases). Thanks to zorinlynx, who adds, "If you move large streams from place to place, for example with "tar" or "zfs send" or use tape, mbuffer is awesome. You can send a stream over the network with a large memory buffer at each end so that momentary stalls on either end of the transfer don't reduce performance. This especially helps out when writing to tapes, as the tape drive can change directions without stopping the flow of data."
TeraCopy is a tool for copying files faster and more securely while preserving data integrity. Gives you the ability to pause/resume file transfers, verify files after copy, preserve date timestamps, copy locked files, run a shell script on completion, generate and verify checksum files and delete files securely. Integrates with Windows Explorer. Suggested by DarkAlman to "replace the integrated Windows file copy utility. Much more stable, quicker transfers, crash tolerant and adds features like 'No-to-all' and 'yes-to-all' for comparing folders."
MultiDesk & MultiDeskEnforcer are a combination of a tabbed remote desktop client (terminal services client) and a service that limits connections to only those that provide the correct shared secret (keeps hackers from accessing your server via RDP even if they have the correct password). Suggested by plazman30 as being "[s]imilar to Microsoft's RDP Manager, [b]ut doesn't need to be installed and has tabs across the top, instead of the side."
The PsTools suite includes command-line utilities for listing the processes running on local or remote computers, running processes remotely, rebooting computers, dumping event logs, and more. FYI: Some anti-virus scanners report that one or more of the tools are infected with a "remote admin" virus. None of the PsTools contain viruses, but they have been used by viruses, which is why they trigger virus notifications.
Mosh is a remote terminal application that allows roaming, supports intermittent connectivity, and provides intelligent local echo and line editing of user keystrokes. It can be a more robust and responsive replacement for interactive SSH terminals. Available for GNU/Linux, BSD, macOS, Solaris, Android, Chrome and iOS. Suggested by kshade_hyaena, who likes it "for sshing while your connection is awful."
HTTPie is a command-line HTTP client designed for easy debugging and interaction with HTTP servers, RESTful APIs and web services. Offers an intuitive interface, JSON support, syntax highlighting, wget-like downloads, plugins, and more—Linux, macOS, and Windows support. Suggested by phils_lab as "like curl, but for humans."
LibreNMS is a full-featured network monitoring system. Supports a range of operating systems including Linux, FreeBSD, as well as network devices including Cisco, Juniper, Brocade, Foundry, HP and others. Provides automatic discovery of your entire network using CDP, FDP, LLDP, OSPF, BGP, SNMP and ARP; a flexible alerting system; a full API to manage, graph and retrieve data from your install and more. TheDraimen recommends it "if you cant afford a monitoring suite."
Tftpd64 is an open-source, IPv6-ready application that includes DHCP, TFTP, DNS, SNTP and Syslog servers and a TFTP client. Both client and server are fully compatible with TFTP option support (tsize, blocksize, timeout) to allow maximum performance when transferring data. Features include directory facility, security tuning and interface filtering. The included DHCP server offers unlimited IP address assignment. Suggested by Arkiteck: "Instead of Solarwinds TFTP Server, give Tftpd64 a try (it's FOSS)."
Tree Style Tab is a Firefox add-on that allows you to open tabs in a tree-style hierarchy. New tabs open automatically as "children" of the tab from which they originated. Child branches can be collapsed to reduce the number of visible tabs. Recommended by Erasus, who says, "being a tab hoarder, having tabs on the left side of my screen is amazing + can group tabs."
AutoIt v3 is a BASIC-like scripting language for automating the Windows GUI and general scripting. It automates tasks through a combination of simulated keystrokes, mouse movement and window/control manipulation. Appreciated by gj80, who says, "I've built up 4700 lines of code with various functions revolving around global hotkeys to automate countless things for me, including a lot of custom GUI stuff. It dramatically improves my quality of life in IT."
MTPuTTY (Multi-Tabbed PuTTY) is a small utility that lets you wrap an unlimited number of PuTTY applications in a single, tabbed interface. Lets you continue using your favorite SSH client—but without the trouble of having separate windows open for each instance. XeroPoints recommends it "if you have a lot of ssh sessions."
ElastiFlow is a network flow data collection and visualization tool that uses the Elastic Stack (Elasticsearch, Logstash and Kibana). Offers support for Netflow v5/v9, sFlow and IPFIX flow types (1.x versions support only Netflow v5/v9). Kindly recommended by slacker87.
SpaceSniffer is a portable tool for understanding how folders and files are structured on your disks. It uses a Treemap visualization layout to show where large folders and files are stored. It doesn't display everything at once, so data can be easier to interpret, and you can drill down and perform folder actions. Reveals things normally hidden by the OS and won't lock up when scanning a network share.
Graylog provides an open-source Linux tool for log management. Seamlessly collects, enhances, stores, and analyzes log data in a central dashboard. Features multi-threaded search and built-in fault tolerance that ensures distributed, load-balanced operation. Enterprise version is free for under 5GB per day.
Ultimate Boot CD boots from any Intel-compatible machine, regardless of whether any OS is installed on the machine. Allows you to run floppy-based diagnostic tools on machines without floppy drives by using a CDROM or USB memory stick. Saves time and enables you to consolidate many tools in one location. Thanks to stick-down for the suggestion.
MFCMAPI is designed for expert users and developers to access MAPI stores, which is helpful for investigation of Exchange and Outlook issues and providing developers with a sample for MAPI development. Appreciated by icemerc because it can "display all the folders and the subfolders that are in any message store. It can also display any address book that is loaded in a profile."
USBDeview lists all USB devices currently or previously connected to a computer. Displays details for each device—including name/description, type, serial number (for mass storage devices), date/time it was added, VendorID, ProductID, and more. Allows you to disable/enable USB devices, uninstall those that were previously used and disconnect the devices currently connected. Works on a remote computer when logged in as an admin. Thanks to DoTheEvolution for the suggestion.
WSCC - Windows System Control Center will install, update, execute and organize utilities from suites such as Microsoft Sysinternals and Nirsoft Utilities. Get all the tools you want in one convenient download!
Launchy is a cross-platform utility that indexes the programs in your start menu so you can launch documents, project files, folders and bookmarks with just a few keystrokes. Suggested by Patrick Langendoen, who tells us, "Launchy saves me clicks in the Win10 start menu. Once you get used to it, you begin wondering why this is not included by default."
Terminals is a secure, multi-tab terminal services/remote desktop client that's a complete replacement for the mstsc.exe (Terminal Services) client. Uses Terminal Services ActiveX Client (mstscax.dll). Recommended by vermyx, who likes it because "the saved connections can use saved credential profiles, so you only have to have your credentials in one place."
Captura is a flexible tool for capturing your screen, audio, cursor, mouse clicks and keystrokes. Features include mixing audio recorded from microphone and speaker output, command-line interface, and configurable hotkeys. Thanks to jantari for the recommedation.
(continued in part 2)

A week ago or so I posted here that the classic app is going down on Oct 14 and my custom DTHs have no way to migrate to the new app. That plus the cloud outages made me decide to move to Home Assistant, and I've now setup everything so I thought maybe some of you would like to see what that process was like.
So this post is to show what my setup looked like in ST before, what it looks like now, and what the process was like.
And I would not call Home Assistant better, just different. There are pros and cons to both platforms.

Hardware

• Raspberry Pi 4 (4GB)
• Z-Wave stick (I used the Zooz plus S2, but there's other with Zigbee integrated as well)

Installation

• Download Home Assistant as an image as per the instructions
• Flash it on an SD card with the software they recommend
• Plug it in and put it on the LAN. After this point all setup is done through the Web UI which you can access via any browser, including desktop which is nice

Configuration

Customization is better in Home Assistant. You can basically do anything and it usually involves using the 'integration' or 'add-on' tabs in the UI, or in the worst case pasting in some .yaml code in a config file through the UI. Here's all their current integrations
The dashboard is customized via the UI and you can put whatever you want in there, in any order, including custom libraries if you don't like the stock stuff.

Z-Wave

Working with Z-Wave is much worse than SmartThings. Adding the Z-Wave add-on is very easy, but in order to add / remove / etc. the network you have to use a very antiquated UI that doesn't work well on mobile at all. It looks like this on my desktop PC. It's basically a web RDP into a Linux docker.
While working with it stinks from the UI perspective, I was able to pair everything with ease and had no issues at all adding all my Z-Wave devices, so that's something.

Remote access

Since it's hosted at your home you either need to setup a VPN to get in (such as on your router, which is what I did), or pay $5/mo to HA's cloud provider so you can use it anywhere. Definitely a con if you want access from anywhere compared to ST's cloud.

Presence detection

This is one thing that never worked well for me in ST. For HA it works perfectly for me using the asuswrt integration. No static IP required.
If you subscribe to the cloud service then the apps on iOS and Android have the ability to report presence like ST, but I did not opt to do this. If you go this option then you can use the 'zones' as well to fire automations depending on each zone the phone is in (such as 'at school' vs 'home').

Automation

In ST automation is with the Smart Apps or WebCoRE (I never used WebCoRE personally), and I never had a problem with it. In HA I'd say it's a more powerful but harder to setup. You essentially get a UI to setup the trigger(s), condition(s) and action(s) which I believe might be similar to WebCoRE. The result is a .yaml file you can edit manually if you wish.

Custom devices and scripts

Here is really where HA wins hands down. There's almost unlimited ways to customize, including a UI-based IoT coding add-on called Node-RED. Anyone who's made a DTH knows the pain of using Groovy and trying to use the graph IDE along with the log. HA is really on another level here. Also given ST's unclear path with Groovy and development UI in the new app, I was much more comfortable here where it's JS, CSS, YAML and at worse Python.

Screenshot comparisons

Best way to show the differences is to.. well, show it. Personal information and camera images are removed.

SmartThings

• My classic SmartThings app that I used for 3 years. It's basically some Z-Wave devices and a few custom DTHs for my custom alarm system, garage door and cameras. I liked using this and aside from the outages and difficult setup at times, it worked well
  
• Here's my alarm system DTH in ST classic
  
• And here it is again broken in ST new
  
• Here's my same setup from classic in the new app. A lot of stuff outside of the simple Z-Wave devices are broken. Sorry I didn't take a long screenshot, I messed it up and now everything is removed
  

Home Assistant

• The main dashboard in the mobile app (or you can just browse using the web browser, it's basically the same)
  
• Same dashboard on the desktop browser. I wasn't able to get it all on the screen. Everything here is out-of-the-box stock HA with the exception of the thermostat card. I used this custom one
  
• You can click on any device and get more information on it. This is automatic for any entity you add to the dashboard
  
• This is what customizing the dashboard looks like. You add any card you want and link it to an entity, all through the UI
  
• The terrible Z-Wave UI
  

60 % Done - Since Reddit allows only 40 K characters in a single post , some of the content of this post is spilling into comments.

Very opinionated writing environment and landscape (VOWEL)

Command line always excited me but it became more of a passion when I started learning Linux (around four years back). Even in graphical mode, there were many good reasons to get into terminal. Slackware presented a new paradigm, with boot right into the shell and startx if you need GUI. While newer distros do great in bringing Linux to Windows (and Mac) users, Slackware still follows the tradition. It could be bit of a learning but it makes you learn the system. An investment totally worth the pain. That said, my Desktop is beautiful Ubuntu Mate and I am exploring nixOS as a lab project.

Going back 20 years, aside my tech job(s), I was always exploring new tools/ platforms to write (and share) effectively. Blogger was a godsend which morphed into love for Medium and finally to my own blog on github pages. Github Pages, enabled me write natively in vim and publish with a simple git push. That led further discoveries into power (and distraction free) writing in terminal. Almost addictive. An year back I discovered command line interface of Reddit (rtv or ttrv). This made life simpler. I could edit live and publish as soon as I save the post on my terminal. No more git repos. It does have few limitations, such as Reddit doesn't allow to embed pics in the text posts or the post size is limited to 40 K ; but that is a very little price for the comfort it offers. And I am anyway not big on pics (or videos). Over these experiments and part time hobbyist indulgences, I discovered few tools and tricks. This post is to summarise them all - as a personal reference and in case someone wanna share the love of labor. Needless to say, these are just a tip of what command line offers to both developers and technical writers. And may be , with little effort (and training), these tools could be accessible to any one who wants to go beyond traditional word processors.

Why Command Line

Less is More

True to the word - command line offers lot more than the graphical user interface. Lets say you have a file with two hundred contacts and you want to pull out the email addresses from number of other fields and put it into a new file. You will probably need to leave your MS Word , pull the csv file in a spreadsheet, copy the email column into another spreadsheet and save back as a comma delimited csv. Fair enough. It will work if all the email addresses were in one field and even then it is a lot of work. All this can be done with just one command on command line.
grep -o '[[:alnum:]+\.\_\-]*@[[:alnum:]+\.\_\-]*' EMAIL_SAMPLES.TXT | sort | uniq -i
reference - https://rietta.com/blog/grep-extract-e-mail-addresses-from-a-text-file/

Information is cheap

Continuing with the example above, one can argue as to who understands this command. Frankly speaking , I don't and neither do I need to. All you need to do is search google (prefer duck duck) once and then this command is in the memory of your terminal. You can store your command history as much as you want and. I have my bash history set to ten thousand. When Steve Jobs ( and or Bill Gates) forced the world into GUIs , the information was hard to come by. The manuals were bad if they were at all there. There was no internet.

More is less

Again with the same example , think for a minute how would you provision such a command in a Graphical User Interface - you can't. With every new , so called "user friendly" layer , the designer of the UI sacrifices a multitude of options. GUI is less CLI . Touch interface is less than GUI. Audio interface is even lesser. You get the point - more comfort means less flexibility.

Time has come

There was a time when when there used to one desktop in a home ; that too was a luxury. So desktop had to be a general purpose machine. It was as much a coding device for dad as much a game buddy for the kid. Those days are gone. We have echoShow now for content consumption , smart phones to get bank and pay the bills. So what is the point of desktop ? Fair point - Desktop is NOT for everyone. But if you really want to get some serious work done, command line is your friend - be it a long document , spread sheet , long emails , social media - everything is available on command line.

CLI has matured

No doubt GUI has gotten stable from the days of Windows 95 but it has become more restrictive further dumbing the users down. Apple is sure leading the cause. CLI on the other hand gotten richer. Gone are the days of remembering commands by heart. There are tools like apropos , whatis and tldr to help you find the commands on the fly. Manual pages are easy to find and search. Plus commands have inbuilt help (with -h flag). And then there is google :-) . In fact , finding help with commands is lot easier than trying to figure out the GUI options. Plus there are all sorts of applications on command line and there is kind of tacit revolution on to further improve CLI.

CLI is beautiful

Gone are the days when CLI was just a black black and white low resolution tty. Now we have terminal multiplexers that allow you to open as many windows as you want , split the windows , have all sorts of status bars and there are themes to enhance not only terminal but also shell experience. The ncurses UIs written in Python and GO are comparable to GUI applications and since they are born out of CLI phiolosophy , they let you configure every aspect of the application through configuration files.
Above all, There is no way to become a developer (or a technical writer) without some degree of exposure to CLI. Might as well tame the beast early on :-)

Goals of VOWEL

• Fast, even on old hardware.
• Distraction free.
• Test the on nixOS and compare if they work as good (or better) as on Ubuntu.
• Prefer "Free" software but don't be a fanatic.
• Build a configuration.nix that delivers quick installation and base level configuration of these applications.
• Use tools that comply with with vi navigation by design or at least have the option for vi -esq key bindings.

Landscape Vs Environment

Configuration of applications and tools to suit a specific role (or taste) is what turns a landscape of applications into an environment that you love. Landscpae is more a cookie cutter approach, an overtly standardized system for all users - typically the approach of Macs and Windows with very little configurability. These systems offer a greater degree of comfort in the beginning but they start staling away as you want your system organized the way you want. Linux (along with open source) culture, offers endless configurability - in choice of hardware, distros, applications.
Configurability does come with a serious challenge when you want to migrate to another hardware. Thus the need to manage your configuration - dot file management. There are number of tools to manage your tools and simplest being keep your dot files in a safe place. Mega storage is a good place to begin with a nice command line interface. Github or gitlab offer even easier ways. With nixOS, nixDarwin and nix package manager, we can further automate the applications installation.

Core System

nixOS

Slackware and Debian are great systems but it takes a lot to set them up and make them personal. Yes, you can carry your dotfiles but over time dot files change and it takes effort to keep even your own machines in sync. Giving your configuration to someone else is a whole different story. And if that someone is new to Linux, it is quite impossible to teach them all the hoops. This is one reason that command line system is hard for the new entrants. At least I felt that and it took me almost four years to get to a point where I feel a minimal install is a viable option. The sad side is, more and more people thus get caught into graphical interfaces and are stuck there for ever while command line interface is more responsive and intuitive - probably easier to grasp. And it has more tools than ever before. And its robust.
I am experimenting with nixOS. At least the promise of full configurability in bunch of text files that can be git over remotely is enticing. Still, in learning phase but the goal is to have all these packages configured to my needs in a single (or few) text files. I must add, I have learnt more about the system configuration in one month with nixOS than I did in last four years with many distros. I guess the simple reason is you are editing / building a configuration file rather than simply installing the packages as you do in other distros. The act of editing the configuration.nix makes you interested in looking at multitude of other system options. For example do you want X or Wayland ? or none of them ? Sure you can do that in other distros but here in nixOS, all this is part of one text file. And it works quite well. My 'work in progress' configuration.nix is in appendix A.
You can get nix manual with command nixos-help. It has all the details of installation , configuration and package management commands. A lengthy read but you can search through it with w3m standard search. On the web ..
https://nixos.org/manual/nixos/stable/index.html#sec-installation

Read and Learn

One of the problem of command line (and *nix systems in general) is, you need to learn a lot and hence endless reading. One of the way (that works for me) is NOT to try to know it all. The help is always available. All you need to know where to look for.

core utilities

Like all distros , core command line utilities are same and work off the shelf in minimal install. You can always type info coreutils to get a complete manual on the terminal. Typing info coreutils ls will directly take you to the command information.

man pages

Of course you can look up the man page for more details. By no stretch of imagination you need to know or memorise all these commands. Just ten commands get you going and they all work well in nixOS - https://opensource.com/article/18/4/10-commands-new-linux-users
On NixOS , if you start from a minimal install, you will need to install the mandb and enable the documentation services for the man. I will comment it out in my configuration.nix in the appendix below.

tldr

tldr is a great tool if you want to save yourself from reading PhD level material on a utility command. tldr find has just eight lines.

whatis

whatis a command that does exactly what the name suggest ... in just one line. If you ask $ whatis cp - it will tell you cp is a command to copy stuff from one place to another. Very useful to take a quick look before you dive deep into the man page

apropos

apropos is like a grep search for the man pages. It looks through all the man pages and give yo back the instances of the search keyword. Almost instantaneous.
Tools aside , the best learning is through using the command line applications and than reconfiguring them. Reading alone doesn't cut it and neither does using the vanilla apps. Most of the CLI apps are on github these days or have community sub-reddits or IRC channels. If you are stuck, you can always create issues on Github or ask on Reddit. I prefer Reddit cuz, the IRC channels are mostly developer focused. Not to mention countless other forums such as Stackoverflow.com or linuxquestions.org

Terminal and Shell

Shell is command line interface to communicate with kernel. Most of the Linux distros default to bash - Bourne Again Shell. Mac root defaults to bash while with Catalina, the users' default shell is zsh.
https://www.linuxjournal.com/content/understanding-bash-elements-programming is a good read on bash exploring the history of shells

fish - a very friendly shell.

bash is a great shell for developers. As writers we can use little help to get us started. That's where fish comes in. A word of caution though - if you are doing nixos-rebuild switch , do it in bash. Sam e in case you are making something off github clones. I had many instances where things didn't work out with fish but worked fine with bash. Probably cuz most the applications have inbuilt bash script that may not translate too well into fish but I am not sure. Need to research this more ..
Fish has a great help file for the new beginners of Linux. As intended audience are the new users of Linux, it truly is a friendly file. Such resources are rare in Linux world.
Before you understand how to set up the variables in fish world, highly recommend exporting EDITOR and BROWSER variables to vim and w3m.
If you know bash and are missing the 'ctrl-r' inverse search, just type the search word on prompt and press the up arrow.
If you set up vi style keybindings in .config/fish/ fish will show you you a nice indicator on the prompt to let you know if you are in 'normal' mode or in 'insert'.

fbterm

The console without graphical system is boring. Yes , I don't want gui cuz not only it takes ton of resources , it also opens the doors to distraction. fbterm fits in nicely. It makes the console look and feel interesting. Many configuration options but nothing that makes it less friendly. The key thing is it allows you to open as many as ten windows from a single log in. You can cut paste across windows. And its super fast. Needs bit of a hack to make it work without sudo privileges
Read https://gist.github.com/zellio/5809852#start-of-content
Install should create a configuration file in the home folder - .fbtermrc , you may wanna increase the font size and source it again. fbterm is available on nixOS but I still need to figure out the setcap command to give it little root .
Why fbterm ? The biggest advantage is fbterm uses fontconfig, to automatically determine fonts for you (if you don't specify one in the .fbtermrc). If you don't want to spend rest of your life figuring the kbd tool for Linux console, my recommendation is to just use fbterm. You can increase the size of the font in .fbtermrc to desired value, just leave the font name blank. However, if you are a purist and don't want to give little root to fbterm , I recommend reading this before you dive deep in kbd (for the rest of the life ;-)
http://blog.startaylor.net/2016/05/30/howto-console/

A word about X - what normal people know as GUI. X is an MIT project, started long before when PCs and Macs. I guess eighties. Its a gorilla in the room. All graphical apps (in unix world) support X and over time, you guessed it, its bloated. There been attempts to revive X. A new-ish project is Wayland and after a lull it's gaining some momentum. Most distros still are X driven just cuz the applications are late to update for wayland. X is bloated to an extent that Apple (back in 2003) , decided to develop its own display software. X works well, its just that it eats away chunk of resources and makes GUI applications lag. If you are really a fan of GUI (though I hate it for many reasons that are long enough for a separate post) , I recommend using Apple products. And you obviously don't need to read further (:- .. That said , there are number of new things that kinda sit somewhere in the middle. These are tiling windows managers such as 'i3 and xmonad' for X and 'sway' for wayland. The good thing with these windows managers (and many others) is you don't need to have a desktop environment. Yes, you wont see the network and notifications icons on the toolbar but those are anyway most useless things. The tiling windows managers are fast and nice. They run fast even on old machines and a typical use case is to have a nice terminal split screen with firefox and cut paste across the pans. I think one should go there only after good comfort on command line. Another good thing is Linux is you can have your system , by default, boot to command line and start x as when you must. Slackware has a simple command startx, on Ubuntu Mate you need to start (and later stop to get back to command line) , service lightdm (lightdm is kinda default display manager for most distros). On nixOS , you can start x with sudo systemctl start display-manager.service . I have addded Xmonad to my NixOS configuration in Appendix A below.

tmux

fbterm is good if you are happy with multiple windows but more often we need to split the pans. Normal use case is to write something while you are also reading off wikipedia. And being able to cut paste from browser to the editor (or even command line). tmux does that without flaw and does ton more. For example you can save the session across multiple logouts , even reboots.You can have multiple sessions - may be one for your research project , other for the blog. You can attach to any session at will. Even merge the sessions if you crazy on productivity but I have never done that. With configuration , you can improve the status bar to make it look like a real computer screen.
tmux can be used independent of fbterm or with in it. I prefer later as it gives a mice smoother feeling to screen at a minimal overhead.
https://github.com/gpakosz/.tmux is a great configuration. It works well on nixOS.

A word about copying configuration off the internet. The word of wisdom is you should develop your own configuration. Which is the best approach. But when you are in a self starting phaseit is almost impossible to focus on just one application to be able to configure it well. In addition, most popular configurations (as the one above) are very well documented. Its not a bad idea to train yourself with such configurations cuz making fingers unlearn the key strokes is harder. The other thing is when you read such configurations , you learn a lot. And people really invest quality time in upgrading these configurations.

Write and Research

vim

The modal text editor that is around for ever and is available on more platforms than any other word smithing software ever. Learning vim is an investment that no serious writer or coder should ignore. Most people make a mistake of trying to remember everything, I would rather spend time on in-built tutorial and understand how to read the inbuilt help manual. With thousand of available plugins , vim turns into among the most preferred development environment. As a writer, you really don't need much of plugins but if you must .. then, easiest way is to use Amir's awesome configuration. README has everything you will ever need to know https://github.com/amix/vimrc#start-of-content

Vim is not just an editor. Its a system of using the ten fingers and a keyboard. Most of the other command line apps offer vim style key bindings. Which means that once you get comfortable with the editor, you will see vim in your browser. Yes , even graphical browsers such as Chrome, Safari and Firfox can respond to vim strokes through extension Vimium. There is a graphical browser -Luakit that implements all the controls exactly as vim. Reddit terminal viewer ( RTV or TTRV ) totally support and expand on vim navigation philosophy. Even shell programs such as bash can be set to behave like vi - just add 'set -o vi ' in .bashrc and experience the comfort of editing long commands as if you are typing in an editor. Point being , vim is more than an editor. It turns keyboard and console into a magical experience.

Vim is available on Mac (and Windows) in a graphical mode - gVim. Best entry point for GUI users to get into the command line experience. If you are an aspiring developer, you will need to get into terminal anyways. Even if you use VScode or other graphical IDE, sooner or later, you will come to terminal. Might as well make it a good experience. If you are a writer and want to approach your writing as a development artifact, Vim will make your journey comfortable. Trust me on this.

Goes without saying that vim is available on nixOS as works as good as anywhere else. You may want to add the environment variable for browser in configuration.nix (and rebuild) to make vim the default editor. Link below for details. https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/377599/in-nixos-how-to-export-an-environment-variable-on-startup

sc - the age old spreadsheet in the terminal reincarnated into sc-im (vim style)

Word editors are great but many times (and for some like me) , the mind works in a spreadsheet. A new framework, a book or even a long post; first kinda structure up in a table and then you use the same to keep a tab on the action items. And for writers on a shoestring budget, we do need to keep a tab on our financials. The command line is not without a spreadsheet and in fact, it is faster than anything you have ever seen on Windows (excel) or Mac (numbers). Granted it doesn't has all the bells but who needs them anyways.
Excellent tutorial and manpage but if you need some motivation, don't miss to read this https://www.linuxjournal.com/article/10699. nixOS doesn't seems to have pre-built sc but they have much improved fork sc-im (naming in tradition with vim). I barely scratched the surface on sc-im and it seems to have lot more features v/s sc. For Ubuntu sc-im and xlsx converter are available at https://github.com/andmarti1424/sc-im/wiki/Ubuntu-with-XLSX-import-&-export.

markdown

markdown is not an application but its a must learn for a writer. Simply put, its a set of notations that will tun your plain text in to beautiful html when viewed by readers. For example, I am writing this post in markdown.
https://www.redeemingproductivity.com/markdown/
vim too understands markdown Syntax. It can paint your headings different colors to make it easy to edit even when you are typing. The basic syntax of markdown (eg # for a heading) is same across all the publishing environments but each one has subtle enhancements and thus you get github flavored markdown or gitlab flavored. Even Reddit has a its own flavor to markdown. Once you get used to basic notations such as headings , bold, italics , embedding links , embedding images etc ; you will be surprised with the ease and simplicity.

w3m

Writing and research go hand in hand. The problem with graphical environment is distraction. Once I open up firefox, I invariably end up on youtube. Not bad if the purpose to to waste time and load your brain with a truckload or crap, however, if you need to spend quality time in research and writing, first thing you need is to rip your machine off all the click baits. That is where w3m fits in. Yes there are number of good text browsers - Links, Lynx and elinks to mention few. I prefer w3m for its built in vim style navigation. It takes little more effort to get started vs links but totally worth the learning effort.
You can press 'o' to open the options pan that is a bit nicer way to configure the browser than writing the configuration file. I guess options ultimately auto generate a config but I am not sure. The only thing I changed is the color of hyperlinks. The default dark blue make them hard to read on my black background.
Simon Formanek suggested an elegant way to search with in the w3m. Here is his solution ..
you can map a macro hotkey to do a 'smart search' for different search engines. once you hit the hotkey it will open a new tab then take you directly to the text field to type in your keyword
$vim ~/.w3m/keymap #assuming your editor is vim
keymap sd COMMAND "TAB_GOTO https://duckduckgo.com/lite/; NEXT_LINK
keymap sg COMMAND "TAB_GOTO https://google.com; GOTO_LINE 6; NEXT_L
keymap se COMMAND "TAB_GOTO https://stackexchange.com; GOTO_LINE 7;
keymap sw COMMAND "TAB_GOTO https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Pa
usage example: hit sg type in hello world then hit enter, then hit tab to go the the next link [Google Search], hit enter to search
Btw there is ddgr (or googler) that can search without firing up the browser but somehow they stopped working on my machine. They offer few nicer options for advanced search and can automatically start the browser for the result you need to go deeper. The downside of these tools is once you open the browser, you wont probably go back to shell to search something new.
Another thing you might wanna add to your keymap is ability to yank the urls to tmux or xsel clipboard.
# EXTERN_LINK = under cursor
# EXTERN = current page
# yank url to clipboard
keymap yy EXTERN_LINK 'tmux set-buffer'
keymap YY EXTERN 'tmux set-buffer'
keymap yx EXTERN_LINK 'printf %s | xsel -b'
keymap YX EXTERN 'printf %s | xsel -b'
For more read at https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/12497/yanking-urls-in-w3m

w3m is available on nixOS. In fact on machine nix manual (nixos-help) runs like w3m - an added advantage.

Dictionary

As a writer, you need to be able to look up the words from command line. There are ample options to search online dictionaries or to even install them locally. https://www.putorius.net/linux-command-line-dictionary.html?unapproved=6469&moderation-hash=237f4efd605bc5e722780152f1d42225#comment-6469 covers all about commandline dictionaries on Ubuntu. In case of nixOS, dictd seems missing but installing dict works well
nix-env -iA nixos.dict

dict is a client for dict protocol while dictd acts as a server and client. With dictd, you can install local dictionaries while dict needs you to define the server in ~/.dictrc with server address. A single line will suffice the purpose

server dict.org

Publishing Platforms

At some point you want to publish your hard work. And if you are like me , you might prefer writing in public and let it shape up with time.

ttrv

ttrv is a fork of rtv - the famous terminal client for Reddit. And its the best thing for writers who want a quick and easy submit on the web without having to worry about version management or setting up their own blog. In addition , Reddit offers all the things such as search optimizations , comments , communities that you will any way run after as a writer. If you want to write for yourself , you can post on your on profile page. The best thing about Reddit is the anonymity ..
Anonymity brings freedom. I don't have to write with fear of judgement. I can understand that people can be nast(ier) if they are masked but that behaviour is over-feared cause I have seen people getting nasty on whatsapp groups where most often we know each other well. Not to say that Reddit is free from all social sins. There are many. But I feel promoting privacy right at the ID is not a bad option. Plus, it's community basis, allows more diversity. A large community doesn't care for your age , location , sex, education, social standing or political affiliations. In a way it's a network mixer while most other social networks build on your real world relationships.
More importantly, ttrv is a good tool. I can write from the terminal in Vim. And capture quick thoughts or 'edits on the go' on my phone . And if I find something could be useful to others , I can post it to relevant communities. It can do pretty much everything that you will expect from a web client or phone app. You can even configure it to see the pics and vids but that is the last thing I will do.
There is not much to configure in ttrv except for exporting environment variables . I recommend adding these two lines to .bashrc
export TTRV_BROWSER=w3m
export TTRV_EDITOR=vim

nixOS has a preconfigured package for rtv. I had few markdown problems with rtv on Ubuntu. The editor treated heading lines starting with # or ## as comments and thus ignored them. ttrv worked well. Also rtv was not showing my inbox. On nixOS , while there is no preconfigured package for ttrv (as of this writing) , the rtv works just fine.

gh

You may rightly think that it is a developers platform (powered by git) but there is a lot a writer can do with github. It offers github pages - a jekyll based static page web server. So you can convert a repo into a full blown static site. Blogs , campaigns , faqs , small businesses - there are many possible use cases.
Github offers a token authenticated basic command line interface to browse, clone and many other features for the repositories. https://github.com/cli/cli
on nixOS
$nix-env -iA nixos.github-cli
My primary use-case though is to create issues. Since my vim and tmux configuration is actively maintained on github , all I need to do in case of a problem is cd to the git repo on my system and
gh issue create
Coming back to conventional wisdom of developing your own configuration. The problem is you will not be able to get this kind of organized (and free) support from the best experts. In addition, by actively using and contributing issues, you are helping the open source community build and support best configuration and tools. Yes, you can always go to web interface and crete issue but that is added friction given you are running a minimal system plus you won't be able to cut paste the error messages.
If you have ample storage, its not a bad idea to clone the repos of your most used applications even if you installed them from apt or nix. Simply cuz you can create issues and read through existing issues with gh ... best way to contribute to these free applications while you are getting best of breed support. win win.

Music

You can easily find people who don't like books or don't want to read in general but tell me if you know a person who doesn't have a some taste of music. Music is what make you run , write and celebrate and also take your failures in stride. And what is "writing " if it didn't have a shade of loss ..

cmus to play music

Very simple and intuitive vi style navigation. You can add all your music to library. Start with the man cmus-tutorial and then you can dive deep into the man page if you need. I never needed to go there cuz it just works. Plays mp3 format without any additional settings. Available and works great on nixOS.

beets - for fixing the music metadata

https://beets.readthedocs.io/en/stable/reference/cli.html

SoX

You may wonder why audio recording needed for a writer. That's true but again my fancies. I love to read my written words aloud. This is my way of editing a long post and many times listening it back helps me with the flow.. and also some new ideas. Talking of ideas - many times you are not in a mood to crank the keyboard. Writers do get mood swings and its a solitary affair. Listening to your own voice, sometimes, can make you a good company :-)
SoX is claims to be swiss army knife of sound editing. In addition to rec and play, it allows you to do a host of operations on the recordings. Trimming, format change, effects . Pretty much like what Audacity does on the GUI.

SoX works great on NixOS. It is plug and play with usb microphones. You might wanna install lame for mp3 support.

youtube-dl to rip songs of youtube and sound cloud.

They were taken down by some stupid digital media copy rights law suite recently bu they are fighting back and god willing it will stay. I have used ytdl for couple of years and it works like a charm. You can even search the youtube from command line with gvsearch or ytsearch but my test after this latest case failed. Youtube is coming back with weird message. Need to log an issue with developers. ytdl is also available on nixOS

Utilities

aerc

Lets face it, email has become pretty useless but that is because stupid people have lined up to give their data to whatsapp. At the same time, email clients have failed. I had hopes from gmail but google turned out to be a big disappointment. Wish they had invested the big dollars on reinventing the mail than copying Reddit in Google Plus (failed as expected). Goes without saying that big corps have no interest in email cuz they want you locked into their prop platforms. Email , by design is a liberated tool. You don't need to use one client (or one server). I tried to push email (vs whatsapp / messenger) in my circles but after a while you give up. And expecting someone to use Mutt (or even Alpine) is as much as asking a pound of flesh.
But .. when all hopes die a new ray of light shows up. And thatsaerc. Everything is NOT rosy. I wasted a full day trying to get it running on Ubuntu Desktop. First their is no binary in the apt system. Second you need to get a app specific password from Mr Google to get gmail working. Even after that, it just didn't work on Ubuntu. Against all hopes, I thought of giving a shot on my lab nixOS system (still under testing)..wow .. they had a ready, fully configured package and it works great with gmail. So nix is already +1 in my list of packages.
nix-env -iA nixos.aerc
It took a while to install on my age old Dell but it did. And withe app specific password that I created for Ubuntu (and never worked) , nix dumped 2000 imap messages into my inbox in a fraction of second. And with vim style navigation , aerc is just a wonder boy .. the way email should be. A big shout out to the team working for Andrew. And this is the first real life GO app that seems to have taken advantage of what language has on the table.
If you are struggling to get gmail going with aerc , this gist may be helpful... https://oren.github.io/articles/text-based-gmail/
note - You can skip the repo clone and make on NixOS as they have a ready package. Good luck on other distros !

fim to see images.

fim claims to be the swiss army knife of seeing images on the terminal (and elsewhere). Named on vim tradition (vi improved), fim stand for fbi improved. fbi is the daddy program to see images on unix frame buffer. And yes , you guessed it , fim follows the vim navigation philosophy which make text and images experience seamless.
fim is available on both apt and nix package manager. For nix

`$ nix-env -iA nixos.fim` 

The quality of pics display on framebuffer is as good as any GUIbased on on the resolution of your terminal. And fim is exceedingly fast cuz there is no overhead of gui. Even on old systems, looking at images feels right at home.
https://www.nongnu.org/fbi-improved/#tutorial_vim
You can look at man fim and man fimrc but I find above link most helpful and complete.

mplayer - a video player for the console and rest that plays literally any format

Yes, mplayer can play old vcds and dvds but it supports everything that I ever came across. One of the best man page describing all the keyboard strokes and commands. Though you will rarely need commands. It just works. To have it point to to linux frambuffer (no x11) , add the lines to configuration as shown in this wonderful article
http://blog.startaylor.net/2016/05/30/howto-console/

vifm - file explorer

Once you are used to the shell, you will rarely go to a file explorer. But if you must , command line has many nice and fast file / folder browsers. I lime vifm for its speed and native vi style key bindings. Just like vim , it allows you multiple pans split vertical or horizontal so that you can view number of folders at the same time. If you are comfortable with vim you will never need to open the man page. By default the dot files are hidden , za toggles between all and 'not hidden' files

a word about all above helpful articles and all the developers of these wonderful apps and their configurations - it inspires me. Technology and internet is built on these giant shoulders (and thousands other unsungs). As writers, we can't escape of it into our pen and paper. I find the popular debate about the future of print media funny cuz if, we can't peel even first layer of technology, we sure don't know adaptation. And its proven fact, that if you can't adapt , you must perish. That brings me to opening of this post. Future of writing is bleak ..unless, writer delves deep into the new medium. We need to be at the front of technology standards, shoulder to shoulder with developers. We can begin with getting rid of mouse and easy interfaces.