Working on laptop and desktop?

oandrew2012-11-11 17:53:08

Programming

oandrew, 2012-11-11 17:53:08

There is a desktop - the main computer on which I conduct all the development. But often you want to continue developing not at home, on a laptop. But a laptop is a different computer, on which one software may not be, projects are not deployed.
And just take it with you and continue the work will not work. It doesn't matter if something doesn't work.
I see 2 solutions.
The simplest solution is to sell the desktop, buy a powerful laptop. And get a computer that you can disconnect from the monitor at any time and take with you. But there are also disadvantages - I broke my laptop (if it is more realistic to carry it with me) - you don’t have a computer at all, lost it - all your data was also lost. You also need to think about backup.
Or set up full synchronization (up to all programs) of laptop and desktop? But it looks unrealistic and uncomfortable.
So I wondered what other programmers do when they have both a desktop and a laptop? How to effectively use them together? Or am I that lazy?

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15 answer(s)

oandrew, 2012-12-26
@oandrew

Thanks everyone for the replies!
I bought Lenovo E330 (i5-3210, 4gb, 500gb) + 4 gb RAM + 128gb SSD
It turned out just the perfect option for me!
Faster, quieter, more compact desktop.
Very comfortably.

AlexeyRU, 2012-11-11
@AlexeyRU

A year ago, a move forced me to abandon desktop development. I had to think.
I thought of buying ASUS UX32VD. I added up to 10GB of memory and installed a 256GB SSD.
The development turned out to be a thrill - the backlight of the keyboard and it is smart
. Sometimes you can play the good nvidia 620m allows.
All files in dropbox ( portable soft ) and 4sync ( mostly slag )
All projects in mercurial on a personal VPS - very convenient.
With you always mobile with 3g from Megaphone which you can always share.

edogs, 2012-11-11
@edogs

Of course laptop.
In case of a breakdown, keep 30 thousand in reserve in order to quickly buy a new backup :)
In case of loss, save all the data somewhere, dropbox or an external drive, backups are still needed.
It is not necessary to take a large laptop, if you take a laptop with hdmi, then the problem of the size of the house is solved by a large monitor, but it will still be easier on the road.
In addition, we are now using an alternative option, due to the fact that you do not need to work on the road, but you need to work in different places. We took an ssd disk, put it in a box with usb3 and raised vmware at all points where we have to work. All the data needed for work is on ssd, it is easy to take it with you, the speed is quite acceptable even with encryption.

Nikolai Turnaviotov, 2012-11-11
@foxmuldercp

You can set up a full synchronization of software and settings through Windows 8 and the New UI Marketplace with SkyDrive - everything goes to the uniformity of settings for tablets and desktops running Win8, everything is tied to a live account, but the settings for a regular desktop software will have to be classic through that same SkyDrive sync. You will have to take into account that now SkyDrive can only synchronize one folder, and throw away the SkyDrive root, for example. to the folder c:\Users\YourProfile is fraught with problems.

Hint, 2012-11-11
@Hint

Good laptop 15.6'' (HP EliteBook), docking station with a large monitor and keyboard, automatic backup to NAS (before the standard Windows backup once a day, now the file history is once an hour on Windows 8).
Options with RDP or two working okrasy in my opinion are awful.

Q2W, 2012-11-12
@Q2W

And I just use the laptop at home, in the office, and everywhere.
But in the office, I still have a large monitor and a comfortable keyboard and mouse, which are connected via a docking station.

hostadmin, 2012-11-11
@hostadmin

I came to sync via Dropbox.

Nikolai Turnaviotov, 2012-11-11
@foxmuldercp

I have a Microsoft Team Foundation Server Express version control system deployed on a server that looks out through NAT. For a team of up to 5 developers, TFS 12 is free.
I store all working projects in it. Visual Studio 12 is on a home server, earlier on a laptop and a work machine, so it’s purple for me where to work from.
Everything else that needs to be synchronized is a database with passwords from keepassx, some sketches in OneNote are also synchronized via SkyDrive installed on all working machines.

Evgeny Elizarov, 2012-11-11
@KorP

There is a server at home where all projects live, the desktop and laptop are configured identically by 98% (with the exception of the additional software needed on the laptop), VPN to the house and I work quietly as on the desktop

nochkin, 2012-11-11
@nochkin

A desktop can break just like a laptop with all the consequences. On the desktop, backup is needed just like on any other computer.
I would keep the code in some central repository so that both computers would have access. And the software will need to be configured once (or you can even copy the configuration from one computer to another).
If the server type code (html/php/cgi/etc) is always connected to the Internet, then you can do without the central repository.
Fortunately, my code is all server code, and therefore I don’t care what computer I work from - at least, my wife’s laptop, where my software is not at all.

Alexey Arakelyan, 2012-11-11
@gtbear

For myself, I decided that it is better to store everything in one place - on an office computer. Therefore, I conduct all development only from it. SSH and remote software execution ( X11 forwarding ) are great for this, given that at home and at work the same provider, the speed is like on a local computer.

Wott, 2012-11-11
@Wott

I have a desktop and a laptop occasionally used. And recently, another workplace has appeared in the office where I temporarily arrive. The laptop was used in the country, where the Internet is weak.
All work at home lives on a server, in the hg repository. In the same place, the settings for Apache and the base live, which, if necessary, rise on the laptop.
Everything is relevant, because they leave the repository for servers.

bruteo, 2012-11-11
@bruteo

Powerful laptop + cloud backup (like Crashplan) + full disk encryption (like Truecrypt)

Ilya Ableev, 2012-11-11
@ableev

If you have a Mac, there is a time machine there.
If you have Linux, and you don’t want to take a steam bath - backintime.le-web.org/ (backup via rsync, tied with graphical stray, knows how to correctly register itself in cron, etc.)
If Windows - there seems to be built-in backup tools.
In all three cases, samba is used on the server side. Therefore, if you need to back up a small command that works on different OSes, you can look in this direction.

Quber, 2012-11-16
@Quber

I used to keep all the data on a portable flash drive. Virtual server, sites, files, programs (portable versions, such as text editors, file zilla, password commander and others). As a result, I insert a flash drive into any computer, open any program from it, launch a virtual server, work on any application without any problems.
Then I thought about losing data, decided to be safe and bought a 750 gig WD portable hard drive with a high rotation speed.
I work in the office and at home without any problems. I took a hard one, inserted it into any computer, everything works. Sometimes I make a backup of important files / data on a Google drive, because in case of data loss, I can extract the backup wherever I am (if I have the Internet, of course).