I’m doing a masters in Germany but I don’t have a portable laptop. It is falling to pieces, so basically my laptop is used as a desktop. so weit, so gut… I am a Linux user, my keyboard layout is programmer Dvorak and a use vim a lot as well. However, sometimes I need to use Windows laptops or desktops to get my uni related things done when I am at the University.

During the last month I have been struggling and cursing the university for using windows. For gods sake, we are studying computer science and embedded systems!… Anyway, I was thinking in buying some low-end laptop just to use Linux and get my job done, but in my bottom of my heart I knew that it weren’t the best solution.

Main problems with windows machines in my university

• They use windows
• Cannot use terminal, I will need Cygwin to do so (it will take some time to install)
• I don’t have Administrative rights
• In Windows it is not available the Programmers Dvorak layout
• Development environments are highly mouse depended, and slow in terms of workflow

After digging in the web for 3 hours I found a solution that:

• Is portable
• Is fast to set up, one minute max
• Is cheap, almost 0 euros
• Do no required Administrative rights

The solution includes:

• Portable keyboard layout - PKL (link): I couldn’t’ stand using just Dvorak layout to do my coding, I really needed the programmer Dvorak layout. A common solutions requires the use of Microsoft keyboard layout creator, and I think it wouldn’t be an efficient solution. However, I found this pkl that it is basically plug and play.
• gVim (link): I chose not to use any kind of terminal, because the tasks in the university are not that difficult so I can stand clicking in time to time in order to compile my job, but at least my I can type as fast as I do in Linux. And also it allows me to use my .vimrc setup.
• USB-stick: to use these programs from there

Conclusion

I ended up minimizing my anger and discomfort of using Windows to do my coding at the University with a highly effective solution. I hope this post will others that hate using Windows for coding.