For years and years I’ve been in the habit of “keeping my workspace clean” by closing apps when I’m not actively using them. This started way back in the early Windows days when RAM was precious and OS crashes we far more frequent than they are today. Fast forward a few decades and I’m still in the habit, both on Windows as well as macOS, despite the fact that every machine I interact with on a regular basis has plenty of CPU and RAM.
I’m going to work on breaking that habit. I’ve just received a replacement for my four-year-old work Intel MacBook Pro - a new M1-powered MacBook Pro with ample RAM and CPU power to burn. My old MacBook Pro was no slouch and it has served me well over the years, but wow…this new M1 machine is a leap forward for sure.
The joys of having lots of RAM are sublime. Right now I have the following apps open and un-minimized:
- Atom
- Slack
- Outlook (O365 - work mail)
- Mail (macOS Mail - personal email)
- Messages
- Safari (personal browsing)
- Chrome (work-related browsing)
- MS Teams
- Excel
- PowerPoint
- GitHub Desktop
- iTerm2
- AnyConnect VPN client
- Music
- Finder
- Photos
- Zoom
Over and above the foreground apps, there’s also a lot in the background:
- 1Password
- Docker Desktop
- OneDrive
- Netskope
- CrowdStrike Falcon
- MenuBar Stats
- Citrix Workspace
Even with all of this stuff going, I’ve got plenty of available memory remaining. Beautiful.
Here’s where it’s going to get uncomfortable: I’m going to see if I can break my habit of closing stuff when I’m not using it. My fingers have strong CMD-Q muscle memory so I suspect I’m going to slip up for a while, but we’ll see if I can break the habit. Wish me luck.
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