Thoughts on openstack dev environment setup

gistfile1.txt

Disruptive
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Random UI focus changes on ThinkPad Yoga 12 (Win8.1)
Frequently experience low-memory conditions (8GB RAM, no VMs)
  "Close programs to prevent information loss"
  "Your computer is low on memory. Save your files and close these programs:"
  "Microsoft Outlook"
Win8 UI/Usability
Frequent reboots required by Windows and Intel corporate updates

Poor Developer Tooling
======================
Text editors
ssh/scp utilities
  Putty is free, but is a poor tool compared to built-in ssh/scp on Linux and Mac OSX
  mobaXterm is nice
    Home/Personal Edition free but is not supposed to be used for non-personal use
    Professional Edition license is $69 per user
Cygwin is poor substitute (when Cygwin is considered for use this is an indication that Windows is getting in the way)

OpenStack
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OpenStack only runs on Linux
For Windows laptop, one has 2 options:
(a) cloud Linux server (requires proper connectivity)
(b) Linux VM (requires laptop with enough memory/disk resources; drains battery faster)

Open Source
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Nearly all developer-oriented open source projects target Linux and Mac OSX

Personal Preference
===================
Keep corporate stuff (email, Lync, MS Office) on separate machine from development
Ideally, corporate Windows instance should be on cloud server within VPN and accessed over RDP
Keep disruptions at minimum while needing to focus on pure development work
Would like laptop running Mac OSX (first choice) or Linux (access Windows through RDP)