We Recommend...

CMS Tools

SurrealCMS

This is a simple and effective CMS tool which will let you manage the content of your own small web site with minimal fuss. It takes a small bit of tweaking to get it started, and you still need your hosting and domain name, but there's no database to worry about and it has a great, low-tech feel to it. Best for simple projects and low-fuss requirements.

CMSBuilder

This Canadian-made CMS is our go-to tool for larger or more complex sites. Unlike market leaders like WordPress, Drupal and Joomla!, CMSBuilder is far more developer-focused. It does not force your site to fit into some 3rd-party-theme or even into a bloated framework that you'll only need 10% of.. It allows you to build just what you need for your site and put it exactly where you want. You will absolutely need to have HTML/CSS skills and some familiarity with basic PHP is helpful. If you feel trapped by WordPress or have security concerns, this is the CMS for you.

Password Management

LastPass

Without a doubt, the first thing I add to a new computer, tablet of phone. This industry leader manages the thousands of passwords and account logins that we need everyday.

File Sharing & Syncing

DropBox

Recognized name in in file storage and sharing, it sets the bar in terms of ease and effectiveness. Widely available across all platforms. Although heavily challenged by Microsoft, Google, Apple and others, the name recognition is enough to give people a great deal of trust.

SugarSync

SugarSync has one winning distinction over DropBox. It does not require that you keep all the files you want to keep synced inside its own folder. It will allow you to keep your personal folders and files wherever you like on your computer. You then map the location of the matching folder on another computers (and another, and another, etc.) Although there are greater costs than DropBox, this flexibility does allow you great flexibility to support your personal or IT-dictated organizational style.

Productivity

Office 365

All your familiar Office titles are included: Word, Excel, Outlook, OneNote, PowerPoint. Plus there are range of lesser known but very useful services such as OneDrive online storage and the new slide show creator, Sway. For a single monthly or yearly fee, you can get all these titles on your home business PCs AND laptops (up to 5), share them with your team, AND add the app-based equivalents to your phone or tablet of any stripe. You just can't find a better value in the mainstream office lineup.

Web Dev

Brackets

This straight-ahead text editor is still in its infancy but it already has a great community and large library of add-ins. Highly extensible and offering some interesting IDE-like file integration features, this is a solid entry in the code wars.

PrePros

A multi-faceted preprocessor to convert your SASS/LESS files to compiled and minified CSS output. Works for a variety of scripting languages and even provides graphics optimization and multi-browser sync. Version 5 became glacially slow to use, but the previews of v.6 show a return to a light and responsive toolkit.

Web Browsers

Firefox

Venerable but renewed, Firefox is a fast, stable web browser which is respectful of your system resources. A huge array of plug-ins add nearly any functionality you could hope for.

Chrome

The darling of the hipster world, Chrome is an excellent web browser with a massive range of feature-extending plug ins. Has a serious greed problem in terms of resource usage.

File Backup

Data Deposit Box (Mission Critical Files)

This is highly responsive critical file backup service. It stores the files you select to an off-site location so that in the event of an emergency, you can access and restore them safely. Use this service to make rapid automatic backups of articles, legal files and other mission-critical documents - even several times each day.

Since this service charges you for the volume of data stored, this is best used for those files that you're actively working on. It can copy multiple file versions and you can tell it how much time has to pass between file saves for it to treat the file as a new version. Very handy!

You should visit their web site and review your backups regularly because if you accidentally include your whole video, photo or music collection in the backup instructions, the costs will mount quickly.

Carbonite

Ideal for long-term bulk file storage. Carbonite is the gold-standard in automatic long term file backup to an off-site location. It can back up your whole PC, all your family videos,  pictures and work files for one fixed annual price. Great stuff! Additional account levels allow you include external hard drives, NAS devices and even your entire operating system in case of a catastrophe.

Your first automatic backup may take several days to complete. Don't forget that your outgoing internet speed is often about 20% of your download speed. So that slows things even further. However, after the initial backup, the daily file review doesn't take long at all. You can also schedule times for backups when you're not working on the computer or trying to watch Netflix in the evening.

Highly recommended!

Web Site Backup

Here we recommend ourselves. We have a number of services to back up you web site files, content, structure and databases. Have a look at our site backup services page and see for youself.