RICHARD CAREAGA_

The Technocrat’s Kit

Would you hire a carpenter who didn’t have his own tools?

I have always brought my own gear to work—configured my way, often in quiet defiance of stern IT policies. My kit is divided into the Corporeal (the hardware that occupies my desk) and the Ethereal (the software that occupies my mind).

Hardware:

• Prime Mover, a maxed-out Mac Studio, supported by a System76 Meerkat backup server and a System76 Gazelle for Linux-native tasks.

• Input & Haptics: Keychron V3 Max TKL with detached ten-key for that old-school tactile feedback.

• The Command Center: A triple-threat of Elgato Stream Decks (XL, Neo, and Flex) for macro execution and workflow automation.

• Visuals: A 27“ LG Ultrafine paired with a 17” external and an iPad Pro as a sidecar.

• The Vintage Touch: My 1982 HP12c handheld calculator—the only device on my desk that has never needed a software update.

• Audiovisual & Production for the JuliaMapping screencasts and the Diary of a Mad Data Scientist™️ productions:

  • Audio: Shure MX7+ dynamic mic through a Focusrite 4i4 interface.

  • Optics: Fujifilm X-T5 mirrorless with a 27mm lens, controlled via iPhone 16 Pro Max.

  • Monitoring: Sennheiser HD 280 Pro headphones and custom hearing assistance via Tru Hearing 7 and Audio-Technica boundary mics.

The Ethereal: Software & Languages

I live in plain text and high-performance code.

• The Languages: Julia for the heavy lifting, R for time-series analysis, and bash or pythonfor the connective tissue. (I keep old friends like C, with occasional flirtations in Rust and Haskell).

• The Forge: DaVinci Resolve Studio for video, Affinity Suite for design, and VS Code/Cursor for development.

• The Automators: Alfred and Keyboard Maestro are the “ghosts in the machine” that keep my workflows frictionless.

• The Environment: I inhabit macOS Tahoe and Ubuntu 22.04, navigating via Arc and the Warp/Ghostty terminals.