My current Indie Hacking toolkit

I thought I could share my current Indie Hacking toolkit. Hopefully, you'll find something interesting in here! A large portion of those tools can be used for free.

Note that only a tiny fraction of those tools are necessary, depending on the business you create/run. Keep in mind that a toolbox is just something that contains a set of tools that you might need. You don't have to pick them all at once. They're in your toolbox, and you can pick them up when you need to use them. Moreover, you don't need to get all of those at once. You can get new tools when you actually need those 🔧.

Alright, let's go! 🚀

My favorite Personal Knowledge Management (PKM), note-taking & journaling tools

PKM: Obsidian (https://obsidian.md)
Journaling: LogSeq (https://logseq.com)
Shared knowledge, inventory, processes, etc: Notion (https://www.notion.so)
Capturing highlights: Readwise (https://readwise.io)
Mind maps: Freemind (http://freemind.sourceforge.net), Whimsical (https://whimsical.com)

My favorite productivity tools

Time blocking and focus: focusd, our upcoming project (https://focusd.app)
Time tracking: Clockify (https://clockify.me)
Tasks: Trello (https://trello.com)
Calendar: Google Calendar
Text expander: Espanso (https://espanso.org)
My time timer (https://amzn.to/3AEU9Hx)
And my whiteboard of course!

My favorite software development tools

IDE: IntelliJ (Feels so much better to use than VS Code), VS Code (because it's useful too from time to time) + VS Code extension packs (https://dsebastien.net/blog/2019-11-24-vs-code-extension-packs-to-boost-productivity)
SCM: Git + Hub (https://github.com/github/hub)
Git GUI: GitKraken (https://www.gitkraken.com/invite/jdXvWeMU). Very pleasing UI for Git, allowing to quickly add/remove hunks (my favorite feature of Git, along with rebase) (heads up: I'm an ambassador for them!)
Source Code hosting, CI & CD: GitHub & Gitlab
Code formatting: Prettier (https://prettier.io) because we have better things to do than format code by hand or waste time comparing code style diffs
Scripting & shell: Bash & ZSH, tmux
Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL): To feel right at home even on Windows
ConEmu + Git Bash + Notepad++ when stuck in Windows-land, configured with a Quake-style dropdown terminal
Linux Terminal: Tilda (main now), Yakuake (past) and Terminator (I'll be back...)
Notepadqq on *nix
User Story Maps and brainstorming: Miro (https://www.miro.com)
UX & UI: Figma (https://figma.com)
Schemas: Diagram.net, Excalidraw (https://excalidraw.com), Visual Paradigm Community Edition
Logos: Logology (https://www.logology.co)
Documentation, knowledge base, processes, etc: Notion
Lightshot for screenshots (Windows)
Correcting mistyped commands: thefuck (https://github.com/nvbn/thefuck)
Testing API calls: HTTPIE (https://httpie.io) and Insomnia (https://insomnia.rest)
FTP & al: FileZilla (https://filezilla-project.org/)
Network analysis: WireShark (https://www.wireshark.org) and nmap
tldr for avoiding wasting days in man pages (https://tldr.sh)
Installers: SDKMan (https://sdkman.io), Winget (https://github.com/microsoft/winget-cli), Homebrew (https://brew.sh), Volta (https://volta.sh)
Spotify (can't live without this one)
f.lux to save my eyes (https://justgetflux.com)
The Chrome Dev Tools and tons of extensions

My current tech stack

Language: TypeScript
Front-end: Next.js, maybe soon Remix
UI: Tailwind
Back-end: NestJS on my most recent project, really enjoyed the DX
Monorepo: Nrwl NX (https://nx.dev/). Really can't live without this one
State machines: XState (https://xstate.js.org)
Immutability: Immer (https://immerjs.github.io/immer)
DB: PostgreSQL @ Supabase (or others), CouchDB
Authentication: Auth0
Infrastructure: Docker & Kubernetes, Minikube and microk8s for dev, kubectl/kubens (https://github.com/ahmetb/kubectx), Skaffold (https://skaffold.dev), Dive (https://github.com/wagoodman/dive)
Hosting: DigitalOcean, Vercel, Netlify
DNS: CloudFlare
Certificates: LetsEncrypt, mkcert for dev (https://github.com/FiloSottile/mkcert)
Reverse proxy: NGINX
Analytics: Plausible (https://plausible.io/sites)
Mails: Mailgun (https://www.mailgun.com)
Integration: Zapier (https://zapier.com)
NoCode: Bubble (https://bubble.io)

My favorite writing tools

Grammar, typos and complexity: Grammarly (https://app.grammarly.com) and Hemingway (https://hemingwayapp.com)
Alternatives: Rephrasely (https://rephrasely.com)
Blogging: My own site, Medium, HashNode and DEV.to
Fiction writing: Scrivener (https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener/overview)

Where to find images and illustrations

Unsplash (https://unsplash.com)
Pexels (https://www.pexels.com)
Kaboompics (https://kaboompics.com)
unDraw (https://undraw.co)
Favicon (https://realfavicongenerator.net)
The Noun Project (https://thenounproject.com)

Where to find fonts

Where I store my files

Google Drive
Synology NAS (DS1812+)
Amazon S3
Digital Ocean

Remote backup services

Backblaze (https://www.backblaze.com)
Amazon Glacier (I'm moving away though)

Tools you can use to find product and domain names

Namecheap (https://www.namecheap.com)
Google domains (https://domains.google.com)
DreamHost (https://www.dreamhost.com)
Domain.garden (https://domain.garden)
Domainr (https://domainr.com)
Namelix (https://namelix.com)
Namae (https://namae.dev)

What I use to check social handles availability

Social handle availability:

NameCheckr (https://www.namecheckr.com)

What I use to find UI inspiration

Dribbble (https://dribbble.com)

Tools you can use to look for existing trademarks

USPTO (https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/search)
BOIP (https://www.boip.int/en/entrepreneurs/trademarks)
WIPO (https://www3.wipo.int/branddb/en)

Tools I use for SEO

Ahrefs (https://ahrefs.com)
Wordtracker (https://www.wordtracker.com)
Sitebulb (https://sitebulb.com)
Keywords Everywhere (https://keywordseverywhere.com)
Keyword planner (https://ads.google.com/aw/keywordplanner)
Google Webmaster Tools
SEM Rush (https://www.semrush.com)
Detailed SEO Extension (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/detailed-seo-extension/pfjdepjjfjjahkjfpkcgfmfhmnakjfba)
Ahrefs SEO Toolbar (https://ahrefs.com/seo-toolbar)
Linked Data vocabularies (https://schema.org)
Google Schema Markup Testing Tool (https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/structured-data)

Tools I use to follow trends

Google Trends (https://trends.google.com/trends)
Exploding topics (https://explodingtopics.com)
Pinterest Trends (https://trends.pinterest.com)
Subreddit Stats (https://subredditstats.com/)

Tools I use for CRM, Invoicing, etc

Odoo (https://www.odoo.com)

Tools I use to create landing pages

Carrd (https://carrd.co)

Services to host and serve images

Cloudinary (https://cloudinary.com)

Password management tools

KeePass (yes, I'm old school)

Solutions for online banking and payments

Wise
PayPal
Stripe (https://stripe.com)

Tools to sell infoproducts

Gumroad (https://www.gumroad.com): great because it acts as the Merchant of Record (MoR)

Tools for publishing newsletters (free and paid)

Revue (https://www.getrevue.co) because of its Twitter integration
ConvertKit (https://convertkit.com)

Tools to create online polls

Typeform (https://www.typeform.com)

Tools to create Slide decks (😂)

Excalideck (https://excalideck.com)

Tools for video recording

Loom (https://www.loom.com)
Screencasts: Camtasia
Use DSRL as a Webcam: Sparkocam (https://sparkosoft.com/sparkocam)
Remove background: XSplit VCam
Record on phone: Filmic Pro (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.filmic.filmicpro)

Tools for video editing

Adobe Premiere Pro

Tools for image editing

Minimize images: TinyPNG (https://tinypng.com) and ImageMagick (https://imagemagick.org)
Resize/convert images: ImageMagick (https://imagemagick.org) and Paint.net (https://www.getpaint.net)
Create animated GIFs: ScreenToGIF (https://www.screentogif.com)
Process photos: Adobe Lightroom
Have some 2D fun: Adobe Photoshop and Gimp (https://www.gimp.org)
Create/edit SVGs: Figma (vector drawing tools are awesome!) and InkScape (https://inkscape.org)
Create illustrations: Canva (https://www.canva.com)

Tools for 3D modeling

Blender (https://www.blender.org)

Tools for audio recording

Audacity (https://www.audacityteam.org)

Tools for streaming

StreamLabs OBS (https://streamlabs.com)

Communication tools

Twitter
Discord, Slack, Microsoft Teams
Calls: Zoom
Book meetings: Calendly (https://calendly.com)
Instant messaging: Telegram
Work & projects: LinkedIn, Polywork with a custom domain (https://updates.dsebastien.net)

Tools for audience building

FeedHive (https://feedhive.io)
TweetDeck (https://tweetdeck.twitter.com)
BlackMagic (trial for now) (https://blackmagic.so)
SparkToro (https://sparktoro.com)

Tools and sites for staying up to date

My Twitter lists (https://twitter.com/dSebastien/lists)
Feedly (https://feedly.com/)
Various podcasts (including the IH podcast)
Hacker News (https://news.ycombinator.com)
ProductHunt (https://www.producthunt.com)

Communities that support Indie Hackers and tools for community building/management

Rosie Sherry's wonderful Indiependent Community (https://gumroad.com/a/249779315/GoImj — full disclosure, I'm a member AND an affiliate)
Indie Worldwide (https://indieworldwide.co)
IndieHackers of course ;-)
Circle (https://circle.so)
Luma (https://lu.ma)
Butter (https://www.butter.us)

Conclusion

In this article, I've listed many of the tools in my toolbox. There are some more, but those are the main ones. You don't have to feel overwhelmed or intimidated by this list. You probably don't need many of those. There are an infinity of tools, but we should only care about those we really need. Don't bring more tools in your life than you need to.

That's it for today! ✨

About Sébastien

Hello everyone! I'm Sébastien Dubois. I'm an author, founder, and CTO. I write books and articles about programming (TypeScript, Web, React, Angular, NestJS, etc), personal knowledge management, personal organization, and productivity.

If you've enjoyed this article then subscribe to my newsletter: https://newsletter.dsebastien.net

You can follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/dSebastien 🐦