Uploaded February 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
The Data Science Lab is a live weekly call. Register at pos.it/dslab! Discord invites go out each week on lives calls. We'd love to have you!
The Lab is an open, messy space for learning and asking questions. Think of it like pair coding with a friend or two. Learn something new, and share what you know to help others grow.
On this call, Libby Heeren is joined by Andrew Heiss as he demonstrates some tips and tricks about his personal workflow and tools that he actually uses to make life easier in Positron. This is the ultimate list of data life hacks to make your workflow soooo much nicer. Check out Andrew's blog post here to follow along with the tools he mentions: andhs.co/dsl
Hosting crew from Posit: Libby Heeren, Isabella Velasquez
Andrew's Website: andrewheiss.com
Andrew's Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/andrew.heiss.phd
Andrew's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/andrewheiss
Resources from the hosts and chat:
🔗 Andrew's blog post containing links to all of the tools he mentions: andrewheiss.com/blog/2026/01/13/dsl-positron-workflow
🔗 Open VSX Registry: open-vsx.org
🔗 DataPasta: milesmcbain.github.io/datapasta
🔗 Pastum (like datapasta for Positron): open-vsx.org/extension/atsyplenkov/pastum
🔗 Positron Project docs: positron.posit.co/migrate-rstudio-rproj.html
🔗 Garrick's data science extension bundle package: github.com/gadenbuie/positron-plus-1-e
🔗 Emil's keyboard shortcut blog post: emilhvitfeldt.com/post/positron-key-bindings
🔗 Native Tabs for Mac: lucasprag.com/posts/underrated-vscode-feature-native-tabs
🔗 Andrew's posit::conf(2025) Talk: youtu.be/UCloM4GcfVY
🔗 Arc browser that Andrew is using: arc.net
🔗 Andrew's YAML headers he sets up using espanso: github.com/andrewheiss/espanso/blob/52da6c43c6d1ebaf3231770b1b66971d1dfb374a/match/markdown-pandoc-quarto.yml#L118
► Subscribe to Our Channel Here: bit.ly/2TzgcOu
Follow Us Here:
Website: posit.co
The Lab: https://pos.it/dslab
Hangout: https://pos.it/dsh
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/posit-software
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/posit.co
Thanks for learning with us! 💛
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction
01:50 Switching to Positron full-time
03:19 Extensions in Positron
04:44 How to evaluate if an extension is safe
07:05 Air extension (auto-formatting)
08:21 Better Comments extension
10:15 Moving the Activity Bar
12:20 Pastum extension (DataPasta equivalent)
14:26 Rainbow CSV extension
15:34 Spell Right extension
17:34 Managing projects in Positron vs RStudio
20:18 "Do you know if there are extensions... that will conditionally format cells?"
20:40 "Do you explicitly add a dot here file?"
21:44 Project Manager extension
25:34 "How did you discover all of these?"
26:38 "How is GitHub integrated into Positron?"
29:10 Peacock extension
31:16 The Connections pane
36:38 "When I change the Peacock color, it's changing colors for everything."
37:59 "Does he use any DuckDB extensions?"
39:05 Raycast 43:35 Raycast scripts
44:30 NotebookLM
45:31 "Is there a hack to manage a repo that is both a project and an R package?"
48:00 Espanso
53:15 "Is Raycast a replacement for Spotlight and Bartender?"
54:00 "Is there an easy way to see all of the shortcuts?"
The Data Science Lab is a live weekly call. Register at pos.it/dslab! Discord invites go out each week on lives calls. We'd love to have you!
The Lab is an open, messy space for learning and asking questions. Think of it like pair coding with a friend or two. Learn something new, and share what you know to help others grow.
On this call, Libby Heeren is joined by Andrew Heiss as he demonstrates some tips and tricks about his personal workflow and tools that he actually uses to make life easier in Positron. This is the ultimate list of data life hacks to make your workflow soooo much nicer. Check out Andrew's blog post here to follow along with the tools he mentions: andhs.co/dsl
Hosting crew from Posit: Libby Heeren, Isabella Velasquez
Andrew's Website: andrewheiss.com
Andrew's Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/andrew.heiss.phd
Andrew's LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/andrewheiss
Resources from the hosts and chat:
🔗 Andrew's blog post containing links to all of the tools he mentions: andrewheiss.com/blog/2026/01/13/dsl-positron-workflow
🔗 Open VSX Registry: open-vsx.org
🔗 DataPasta: milesmcbain.github.io/datapasta
🔗 Pastum (like datapasta for Positron): open-vsx.org/extension/atsyplenkov/pastum
🔗 Positron Project docs: positron.posit.co/migrate-rstudio-rproj.html
🔗 Garrick's data science extension bundle package: github.com/gadenbuie/positron-plus-1-e
🔗 Emil's keyboard shortcut blog post: emilhvitfeldt.com/post/positron-key-bindings
🔗 Native Tabs for Mac: lucasprag.com/posts/underrated-vscode-feature-native-tabs
🔗 Andrew's posit::conf(2025) Talk: youtu.be/UCloM4GcfVY
🔗 Arc browser that Andrew is using: arc.net
🔗 Andrew's YAML headers he sets up using espanso: github.com/andrewheiss/espanso/blob/52da6c43c6d1ebaf3231770b1b66971d1dfb374a/match/markdown-pandoc-quarto.yml#L118
► Subscribe to Our Channel Here: bit.ly/2TzgcOu
Follow Us Here:
Website: posit.co
The Lab: https://pos.it/dslab
Hangout: https://pos.it/dsh
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/company/posit-software
Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/posit.co
Thanks for learning with us! 💛
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction
01:50 Switching to Positron full-time
03:19 Extensions in Positron
04:44 How to evaluate if an extension is safe
07:05 Air extension (auto-formatting)
08:21 Better Comments extension
10:15 Moving the Activity Bar
12:20 Pastum extension (DataPasta equivalent)
14:26 Rainbow CSV extension
15:34 Spell Right extension
17:34 Managing projects in Positron vs RStudio
20:18 "Do you know if there are extensions... that will conditionally format cells?"
20:40 "Do you explicitly add a dot here file?"
21:44 Project Manager extension
25:34 "How did you discover all of these?"
26:38 "How is GitHub integrated into Positron?"
29:10 Peacock extension
31:16 The Connections pane
36:38 "When I change the Peacock color, it's changing colors for everything."
37:59 "Does he use any DuckDB extensions?"
39:05 Raycast 43:35 Raycast scripts
44:30 NotebookLM
45:31 "Is there a hack to manage a repo that is both a project and an R package?"
48:00 Espanso
53:15 "Is Raycast a replacement for Spotlight and Bartender?"
54:00 "Is there an easy way to see all of the shortcuts?"
