[vundercind]

Because all operating systems are terrible but the rest are so incredibly bad that Apple’s are still by far the best, once you add up time saved by features and capabilities and subtract time lost to pain-in-the-ass brokenness.

(Two decades on DOS/Windows home series and NT, at least for gaming and sometimes work, twelve years with Linux as my main desktop OS, started on Android for smartphones, before finally giving Apple a fair chance around 2011 or 2012… because I was issued a MacBook at work and was doing dual-platform mobile dev—FWIW I was rooting for BeOS back when it was still a thing, it was great)

[itsoktocry]

>Apple’s are still by far the best

MacOS may not even be the best (that's subjective), let alone "by far" the best. How can you make this claim when you haven't used Linux in a decade?

[vundercind]

I have used it in the last decade, quite a bit. I try it on the desktop every couple of years. My home server is Debian (too lazy to switch it to FreeBSD when it’s working Ok, I rarely modify it, and the way I use it I never have to mess with Systemd anyway), and nearly all the software I write at work targets Linux one way or another.

Also it’s on my Steamdeck, so I get a good dose of the usual jank any time I have to use the desktop mode for anything.

[freedomben]

If you've been on a MacBook since 2011 or 2012, it's definitely time to give modern Linux a try. It has come in enormously long way since then. I am not exaggerating when I say, I have a better out of the box experience with Fedora. Then I do with Mac OS. Mac OS certainly has a lot of features, and visually has a great deal of Polish, but it also increasingly has a lot of bugs.

[vundercind]

I try every couple years. I tried KDE on Fedora last time (I hate gnome since 3) and could still crash various KDE apps with drag-n-drop operations—I’d trained myself never to use those outside narrow situations on Windows and Linux years ago because they usually broke things or did something stupid, but am now accustomed to them both working and doing something reasonable, so I spot those issues in a hurry when I use other environments now, and no longer accept that as just the way things are. Among other jank and poor stability, that’s just an example.

IIRC making caps another control anywhere I was logged in—not just in KDE—was weirdly hard, too.

Five or six years ago my Ubuntu tv-attached old desktop forgot how to decrypt the root disk its own installer had encrypted, after an OS upgrade.

My Debian server required manual intervention (busting out my rusty Gentoo chroot grub-installing skills) to install its bootloader. The manual version went the same aa usual and had no problems so no clue WTF the installer was trying to do, but it consistently failed, and this was boring, old business-class Lenovo workstation hardware. That was four or five years ago.

Basically when I try to go back I’m missing lots of features and it’s less stable than what I’m now accustomed to, so end up wasting a bunch of time and regretting it.

[aunty_helen]

Hard in this camp too. The OS tinkering that is as requirement of Linux racks up a massive time investment. When you use your computer for work, that bill gets big quick and sometimes it's an inconvenience you just can't afford.

MacOS, for all it's faults, can be tamed with little snitch and a slower update cycle, and then you have a relatively solid system. There's still some things to hate, like when I take my airpods out if I accidentally click one of the buttons Apple Music opens (no one wants to use Apple Music, ever). But, that little frustraition pales in comparison to the build your own experience a poweruser in Linux faces on a weekly basis.

This randomly came front of mind last night when I thought, I can't remember the last time something broke on my laptop. It's been literal months since I've had anything weird or unwanted that I've _had_ to deal with. Contrast that to the last time I tried to daily Linux, about 2 years ago when I bought a framework and couldn't even log in due to trackpad issues, sleep / hibernate issues, screen resizing issues, issues issues issues.

[vundercind]

I have plenty of complaints about Apple’s stuff, but my consistent experience when I try to use something else, for the last decade+, is that I’m jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire. Even goes for things like Shield vs Apple TV.

I very much wish they had one or more peers putting them under pressure to do better, but the (tiny—which is likely part of the problem) set of competitors seem to have other priorities than chasing the particular market that Apple does.

[smm11]

I switch between OS X and Ubuntu a few times a year, and the only difference is that I have to restart Ubuntu far more often than OS X.

All I run is a browser, text editor and terminal, so functionally it doesn't matter one bit.

[itsoktocry]

>The OS tinkering that is as requirement of Linux racks up a massive time investment.

Huh, strange.

I install Ubuntu as a daily driver on every system in my house and don't have to do any tinkering outside of customizations I want (which I have more freedom to do).

I mean, I understand there are certain proprietary devices or software that are going to require Windows or MacOS, and that's unfortunate. But the idea that everything is breaking all the time? I just don't see it.

[ActorNightly]

I don't get why people still spread the lie that you have to tinker with Linux. Like right now, I can give you a laptop with a clean Linux Mint install, and you never have to touch the terminal for anything system config to do work.

Seriously, its not that hard to say that you prefer MacOS because you like the feel of it. It does a lot of handholding for you, unlike Linux, which makes it way less likely for you to mess something up. You don't have to go the extra lengths to justify it lol.

[mh-]

> I don't get why people still spread the lie that you have to tinker with Linux.

It doesn't feel charitable to call people sharing their experience "spreading the lie". You're all over this thread talking to people that way. If you're trying to make the case that desktop Linux no longer has this characteristic, this isn't the way to go about it.

[justonenote]

That really depends on what type of work you are doing and your specific combo of hardware. And yes you can do work, but when sleep and power management doesn't work it's a significant QoL downgrade.

If you want to use CUDA as a simple example, you'll have to go through the process of using nvidia proprietary drivers and I'm far from well versed on it but that gives me random warnings and I don't quite get the compatibility between it and Xorg/Wayland or which combo to use and I have on more than one laptop ended up with a system that works but that the desktop randomly freezes requiring a hard reboot.

I still do use Linux Desktop and try various different Debian based or Fedora distros out but you definitely do end up tinkering. I don't use MacOS fwiw.

[ActorNightly]

The only issue that I have ever had with drivers is when the ubuntu automatic install defaulted to the latest open source ones which weren't being recognized.

For a whole bunch of other installations, following official linux instructions on Nvidia works incredibly well. Im probably up to like 30 installs of linux mint on laptops and desktops, without issues. I had a personal laptop with manjaro that suppored nvidia prime, I didn't even have to do anything special, just installed nvidia-smi, and prime-run worked out of the box.

And generally, for equal comparison, I wouldn't consider laptops with discrete graphics to be in the same family as more business oriented Macs, the more apt comparison would be those with AMD chips with integrated video drivers, for which you don't need to fuck with any drivers.

[godelski]

  > If you want to use CUDA as a simple example,

When was the last time you tried this?

If your "CUDA" needs are pytorch, tensorflow, whatever, pip install (or uv pip install) and you're good to go.

When was the last time you even needed to? If you need to do actual kernel writing and thus actually need CUDA (this is pretty uncommon and I think most people that do that wouldn't be asking this question), then most of the issues are not actually issues.

I'll give an example of my latest CUDA error. I run EndeavourOS (Arch based) and so yes, using bleeding edge drivers. Did an update, reboot, oh no... I get to lock screen, login and black screen (but cursor).[0] What's the solution? Roll back cuda. Didn't work? Roll back kernel. Now it works. The problem? nvidia-560-35.03-9 was incompatible with kernel 6.11. I even was able to find in the forums (quickly) the exact issue[1].

But why am I saying this is no biggie? Well... I'm fucking running 560 drivers, which are beta. If you worry about these issues, don't. If you don't want that power, don't run Arch, Gentoo, or other bleeding edges. You know the most confusing part of this all? Was people posting their driver versions with `inxi -G` and so you only see `560.35.03` but I had to roll back `560.35.03-9` to `560.35.03-6`. But also, Nvidia could be better about their namings.

I will also concede that there is a lot of shit information out there and actually parsing what the real answers are takes experience. So here's my advice when you run into your next issue:

  Getting Information:
  - Start with journalctl and dmesg (try `journalctl -b -p 3` and `dmesg -L -l "err+"`. `-b` is only messages since last boot and the other flags are to only give you errors or worse). These are your "logs" 
    - There are others, and they *should* go under `/var/log` but just like in OSX how random junk goes to {~,/}Library/{Caches,Application Support}
    - Check versions, especially if you did an update
      - (side note): For all those confused where files should go, try `man hier`
  - Good chance you can get through by reading the man page, but this doesn't always apply 
    - also remember you can do `man 7 man` or `man man.7` (replace second man with any command). Also see `man -a man`
    - Don't know what man page you need? Try `man --regex cuda`
  - Visit the Arch Wiki (even if you're not on Arch) -- maybe even the Gentoo Wiki. RedHat docs are also pretty good
    - After that, try your distro's (or their parent's) forums.
      - Archwiki is good, Arch forums are a toxic hellhole occupied by people who's idea of grass is entirely contrived from what is visible on a screen. Use the forums of the children. I'm sorry to those who've experienced that place.
  - Then try Google, focusing on things from your logs. This would be up higher, but you can put quotes around things or dates and Google will outright disrespect you now)
    - If it is a specific program that looks to be the issue, try the Git{Hub,Lab} issues page too. Feel free to open an issue. Most devs are pretty nice, even to noobs, though there are also many who will insinuate you RTFM after quoting and linking to it. I'm also sorry about this.

  Solving issues:
  - First try rolling back. If you're not messing with your system, this can make most problems go away VERY quickly. 
    - If you're on a rolling release distro (like Arch) then this is your goto. Unless you like problem solving. But then why are you on Arch? 
    - With `pacman` this can usually be done quickly with `pacman -U file:///var/cache/pacman/pkg/thing-you-want`. You can use other tools, but this is good to know, and you know where things cache :) (`downgrade` is the common tool but it just does this) You can even do kernels this way!
    - Things like `timeshift` are useful (and the `pacman` or `apt` "autosnap"). But beware if you aren't using `grub` to just not do that option. Also check out `btrfs`
    - If need to reinstall an old kernel and it isn't in your cache check out the command `reinstall-kernels` (try `cat /usr/bin/reinstall-kernels`). This is a uncommon task and might only be because you've filled up `/efi` and deleted a kernel.
  - Stop fucking with the kernel if you don't know what you're doing. 99% of the time this is ***NOT*** the solution[2]
    - For nvidia you might want `nvidia_dr.modeset=1` and ***maybe*** (probably not) `nvidia_drm.fbdev=1`
  - Use `find` and `grep`.
    - I'm not joking, `find` is a crazy powerful tool and people sleep on it. (Seriously, how do people jump into large codebases blind and get running without `find`, `grep`, `awk`, and such tools?)[3]

But honestly, you'll need to do none of this stuff if you're on a "baby" distro. I very much welcome people to become more experienced at linux but not everyone needs to be and there's no issue with using a distro that holds your hand (OSX and Windows do). But I would strongly encourage any programmer (not just linux users) to become more familiar with the cli. There's an investment cost, but you'll reap >10x rewards from these efforts, even in general programming situations.

[0] For the fun of it, I asked GPT and gave it logs from journal and dmesg, it did not get the answer, and listening to it would have sent me down a rabbit hole where I'd be messing with the kernel (I use systemd and dracut, these were communicated to GPT and it was asking me to run mkinitcpio and mess with grub lol)

[1] https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/only-black-screen-after-logi...

And hey look, an update: https://forum.endeavouros.com/t/attention-nvidia-gpu-driver-...

[2] For me `/etc/kernel/cmdline` looks pretty much like `nvme_load=YES nowatchdog rw root=UUID=<that> resume=UUID=<blahh> nvidia_drm.modeset=1 nvidia_drm.fbdev=1` It should be short

[3] Here's a free one for you. Got a python project and you forgot to place `__init__.py` in the folders? `find src -type d -exec touch "{}/__init__.py" \;` (replace `src` with your root source directory)

[aunty_helen]

I’ll put this out there, currently there’s no better platform than macOS on apple silicon for developing ai systems.

I’m not a stranger to Linux or the command line. I own, use, configure servers as part of my business, including the dreaded on metal cuda install. In fact, the terminal integration in macOS is one of the biggest things over windows for me.

But, every time I try linux desktop, for the past 20 years, it’s been a horrible time sink and has driven home the point that building a competent and most importantly consistent gui based os is harder than everyone gives it credit for.

I stopped using Linux mint after installing it on my desktop and having the screen saver require a hard reboot -sometimes- when trying to wake.

[ActorNightly]

>there’s no better platform than macOS on apple silicon for developing ai systems.

Lmao WHAT?

The ANE system isn't even remotely useful, since is primarily designed for running Apple AI stuff. This is why its integration is so spotty. IIRC, Tinygrad is faster on apple silicon than pytorch at this moment, solely because they did a whole bunch of reverse engineering.

Laptops for ML is just a lost cause as far as matrix multiply is concerned. Nobody is actually doing any serious work on ML stuff on laptops.

>In fact, the terminal integration in macOS is one of the biggest things over windows for me.

Which is funny, because Windows has WSL2 which works incredibly well, has native CUDA integration for ML tasks thats quite good, has an X server that lets you run GUI apps, and is actually linux (not BSD), without anything to get in your way, and its better because its an isolated system that you don't have to worry about bricking and not having a usable computer.

> stopped using Linux mint after installing it on my desktop and having the screen saver require a hard reboot -sometimes- when trying to wake.

The standard argument of "here is a particular bug that doesn't exist on Macs, therefore Macs are better" lol.

Like I said, its not really that difficult to say that you just prefer the Mac OS experience and end it there. You don't have to go on these weird tangents.

[pjmlp]

Linux on laptops is lots of fun, last one was getting UEFI to even acknowledge there was anything Linux related on a SSD.

[consteval]

The reason you have to tinker with MacOS and not Linux is because you're fine with how MaxOS is set up. So you waste your time in Linux getting it to behave like MacOS.

Obviously if you go into it with the assumption MacOS is correct and the more like MacOS you are, the better, then Linux distros will fail horribly.

People do this with Windows, too. If you go into it expecting Windows-isms you're gonna be very disappointed. And such "isms" aren't actually good at all - usually they suck. But because you already know them, they aren't "isms" anymore, they're now expectations.

If you go back to the very first few times you used MacOS (or OSX at the time), you'll realize there was a lot of shit that surprised you. You adapted, and in some cases have actually come to PREFER functionality that sucks. And now you expect it, and that's the problem.

[aunty_helen]

I had macos forced on me when I joined a company writing forex software. You’re right, it sucked learning all the different keyboard shortcuts, learning to use an extra modifier key (now one of my favorite things) and just little things like double clicking a file renames it :/

I thought it was crazy using the butter knife (from the meme) to write serious software. Previously I was a windows admin at a 500 computer site and dealt with Microsoft, debugging issues in their kernel. Throughout this time I’ve also use Linux extensively from Ubuntu when it came with pc mags to raspberry pi home security projects to servers and boxes. I even compiled gentoo one time for fun.

I have enough experience to know the differences between all of the operating systems from ‘95 through to 22.04LTS. No, macOS can’t be beaten for desktop experience, except for gaming which is now starting to come around also.

Happy to die on this hill.

[vundercind]

The modifier key choice is (among popular solutions) simply correct. I had twoish decades of Windows/Linux shortcuts in my head so it took a few months to get comfortable with a Mac keyboard, but it’s simply better. The cmd key location is excellent, you can feel how much less strain there is in your hand hitting cmd+c vs ctrl-c, and your fingers aren’t pulled away from the home row. Between that and not conflicting with terminal signal shortcuts, it’s the right way to do it (among common choices, anyway—I’m sure someone out there has some custom solution that’s better).

It’s weirdly hard to get Linux to use that keyboard layout and shortcut set, which is a shame. There’s demand for it, and some attempts to make it happen, but it must be really tough to achieve.

Their default English layout is also easily the best of the major options I’ve seen, as far as simply typing English-language text goes. I don’t get why other platforms don’t clone it and use it for their default. No way it can be covered by patents, I think it’s been mostly the same since before OSX. Linux has one alternative layout that’s close to as good, but never seems to be the default English keyboard, for some reason—you have to know you want it.

[nyarlathotep_]

This ^

I always have at least one Linux machine around that I use primarily, but it's never been reliable. Either Debian or Ubuntu, I always, without fail, have issue with sleep/wake/hibernate and will never bet it'll wake properly when they sleep.

My current Ubuntu desktop with AMD cpu doesn't sleep and has to be manually hibernated.

My HP Dev One laptop with PopOS will fail to wake roughly 1/10 times, requiring a hard reset. Other times it'll fail to sleep and overheat in my backpack. Occasionally, it'll stop recognizing USB peripherals, or the trackpad/keyboard will stop responding to inputs.

I prefer Linux on nearly every front, but having a totally unreliable computing environment makes it a deal-breaker for me.

> "Have you tried $THING"

No I really have grown tired of waking a machine to a blank screen and having to ssh into it to kill gnome or any of the other crap.

My Macs very occasionally freeze on wake too--but that's exceedingly rare compared to the myriad issues with Linux usability.

[TheSkyHasEyes]

Give XFCE a chance.

> That was four or five years ago.

Linux moves way faster than commercial OS IMO.

Reconsider linux. Commercial OS isn't going to 'get better' for IT literate users. :/

[vundercind]

XFCE was my favorite back in my Gentoo days, after I started using laptop hardware fast enough that it wasn’t noticeably slower than my prior favorite, WindowMaker :-)

When I used early Ubuntus on desktop machines (back when Ubuntu wasn’t terrible—before the PulseAudio fiasco and the following series of bad decisions and failed maneuvers against Red Hat) I usually just stuck with the default of Gnome2. That era’s by far the closest I’ve seen Linux get to Just Working.

[edit] FWIW I do find Void with a very-light window manager pleasant to use, but I don’t want to have to self-serve every little feature these days, so it’s pleasant but impractical for my actual life. Nothing short of a full DE, so just KDE or Gnome, with a batteries-included distro, stands a chance of matching what I’m used to just being there and happening for me without my having to ask for it. Unfortunately, I strongly dislike both of those DEs for different reasons. :-/

[herpdyderp]

Hard disagree. Every Linux-running personal computer that I use or have used is a terrible experience. Something is always broken, the whole system needs to be hard rebooted at least a few times a week, parts of the OS will randomly stop working each day, the list goes on and on. macOS is not perfect by any means, but at least I can actually get work done on it.

[Volundr]

As a counter anecdote, I run Arch on everything except the MacBook I was issued for work. They've all been running perfectly for years, I can't remember the last time I had an issue that wasn't ZFS failing to compile for a new kernel, and I opted into that problem.

Meanwhile my work Mac every so often decides my external monitor just doesn't exist anymore and I have to reboot with it unplugged, then again with it plugged in to get it back.

[exe34]

> Something is always broken, the whole system needs to be hard rebooted at least a few times a week

I remember this sort of thing about 15 years ago, but in the last 8 years of nixos, I've maybe hard rebooted twice. I've also only ever rebooted after an upgrade. otherwise I go months with just sleep/wake. I wonder if you have some interesting hardware...

[zdragnar]

Funny, I have the exact opposite experience. My Linux laptops just work. My last three Mac laptops were a pain to use.

[2OEH8eoCRo0]

Some of the most productive developers that I've known have been on Linux since the 90's.

[ActorNightly]

In early 2010s this was sometimes the case.

In modern days, you can daily drive linux without issues. If you were having issues, it was most likely you were doing something wrong, or you were using a company configured laptop that the IT department didn't set up right.

[bolebob]

This is still the case. KDE is full of bugs, bluetooth does not work properly (it fails to swap between hidef to a microphone/speaker setup automatically), 4K monitors have all kinds of problems (though KDE 6 fixes quite a few), hardware decoding in firefox/chromium for videos is a horror, the stupid fan starts all the time out of nowhere (by far the most annoying intel machine behaviour, thermals in windows are much better), and battery is dead after a three-four hours max (and usually much worse than windows on the same horrible x86 hardware).

A macbook air is miles ahead, unless you confine yourself to old hardware. I moved from thinkpads + arch to mac + brew. The experience is insanely better.

[KronisLV]

> and visually has a great deal of Polish

It's great that they translated the UI in that language!

Jokes aside, I use a mix of Windows 10, Windows 11, Linux Mint (have had a few DEB and RPM distros on the desktop too) and macOS. I have to say, that all of them are serviceable.

Windows is sometimes quite annoying to deal with, but has a lot of software for it (the likes of PowerToys, MobaXTerm, WinSCP, System Informer, Handbrake, 7-Zip, HWiNFO64, MiniTool Partition Wizard, MPC-HC, Rufus, ShareX, XSplit VCam, VSeeFace and others). You can do most of the same things in alternative software in other OSes, but there's a huge variety to be found, same as with running most of the games out there natively. The UI feels hit or miss and worse in Windows 11 than in 10 in some regards (no vertical taskbar, for example, need fixes for the context menu etc.), but the OS feels usable.

Linux Mint and other Linux distros are pretty much ideal for software development, hands down. Most tools work, the resource usage is great, there's a huge knowledgebase on how to do things out there, it's quite customizable and can be used on servers, desktop computers or even an old low spec laptop alike. I personally settled on Cinnamon, but XFCE was very usable and someone might prefer GNOME or KDE (there were even attempts at reviving the old Unity desktop from Ubuntu, that one might have gotten hate when it was the main option, but actually had its nice bits too). Gaming is hit or miss with Proton (many games will run but definitely not all, also forget about playing anything with invasive anti-cheat solutions), sometimes you also won't be able to get some productivity software running, if it's developed only with Windows in mind, Wine isn't a silver bullet but it's nice that it exists.

My M1 MacBook as an overall computer feels like it has great build quality despite the overpriced hardware. I'm mentioning that, because it's very well integrated with the hardware and I haven't had any weirdness due to that yet, like the touchpad on a laptop stopping working after a fresh Fedora install, or needing to compile Wi-Fi drivers from a GitHub repo for it to work at all, or Windows looking at the RAM available in a laptop and deciding that it wants most of it for itself and to slow everything down to a crawl. In macOS, the desktop also feels polished, is reasonably customizable, though sometimes is a bit jarring compared to both Windows and Linux distros, as are the things surrounding it (everything from the keyboard layout, to how managing open programs works, also connecting to an external 1080p monitor is a miserable experience because it doesn't fit within their own hardware ecosystem either). Development is doable, unless you go for the 8 GB version because you need the OS for a project and can't afford anything more, gaming feels way more limited than on Linux distros, but nothing feels particularly broken either.

Neither is ideal, neither is horrible. They're all somewhere in the middle, doing more or less well when it comes to particular aspects.

[pndy]

> It's great that they translated the UI in that language!

Bit offtopic but since you nudged it:

The oldest Polish localization of MacOS was done by a private company that insisted on using more "appropriate linguistically" terms that have roots in the 70s Polish IT. Tho, some people claimed it was just an attempt to separate Apple's system from Microsoft's even more dramatically. And for example instead of "icon" - "ikona" that translation introduced "stamp - "znaczek"; "edit" menu item - "edycja" (sometimes "edytuj", depending on program) was "change" - "zmiana", "folder" that stayed as it is become "teczka", "briefcase". The most prominent example is the "cancel" translation, which elsewhere become "anuluj" but the team opted for "abandon", "cease" - "poniechaj", tho some argue it should be "desist" - "zaniechaj".

The first official Leopard translation followed let's say, the 'industry standard', tho "desktop" still is being called there "biurko" while Linux and Windows uses term "pulpit" which is more close to "dashboard".

The discourse that happen around "cancel" translation is still bring up on few occasions, as an example of trying to preserve origins of that old IT glossary and also of being nonconformistic to the ridiculous levels for some weird personal reasons.

Echoes of that translation can be seen in the Polish KDE localization - there's one contributor who insists for using these rather obscure and weird terms: https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=404286 and since there's no official community nor team (to my knowledge), that translation gets approved and makes KDE looking weird for someone coming from Windows

[legacynl]

oh my god, that person arguing for zaniechaj seems like the most obnoxious person ever.

[pndy]

Worst thing is, he apparently still messes up KDE translation - "session" was changed to "posiedzenie", "sitting", "plenary"

[tsimionescu]

I very much doubt that. I tried installing Fedora on my new laptop, and the defaults are horrible. It doesn't even support two-finger gestures on the login screen, so you have to right click in a different way before logging in.

At least it's not as bad as Ubuntu, which allowed me with a simple warning to install Nvidia drivers without a full system update, which broke the system so badly it couldn't even boot anymore, o an otherwise newly installed setup.

And Debian is horrible too, it doesn't even have a task bar of any kind (you are forced to Alt tab to switch apps, or even see which other apps are running), unless you go hunting for some extensions someone made.

All of these can be made to work decently, but calling it a good out of the box experience is laughable.

[itsoktocry]

>It doesn't even support two-finger gestures on the login screen, so you have to right click in a different way before logging in.

A default setting you don't like and have to adjust? How horrible.

>At least it's not as bad as Ubuntu, which allowed me with a simple warning to install Nvidia drivers without a full system update

So...user error?

>And Debian is horrible too, it doesn't even have a task bar of any kind (you are forced to Alt tab to switch apps, or even see which other apps are running)

Now I get it, this is satire for someone complaining about the Linux experience. Good one!

[tsimionescu]

> A default setting you don't like and have to adjust? How horrible.

No, even after adjusting the settings, they only apply after you log in. So every time you hit the login screen, you get the default settings again until you log in.

> So...user error?

Yes, of course. And it's well known that the penalty for user error is supposed to be complete failure to boot, especially for people new to a system.

> Now I get it, this is satire for someone complaining about the Linux experience. Good one!

Maybe throw in some constructive ideas rather than empty grandstanding? Is it supposed to be a good thing to not have a list of running apps? Is it normal to have to install extensions to your desktop environment to make it work for common worlflows?

I am not complaining about defaults here, there is just no option in Gnome to get a basic bit of UI working like all other desktop environments have worked for 30 years, including Mac, Windows, KDE, XFCE, and past Gnomes. You have to discover and install 3rd party software to get basic UI. This would be like someone launching a new browser that doesn't support tabs out of the box, and people saying "oh, don't complain, there's an extension someone else made that adds tab support".

And note that I'm specifically criticizing the out of the box experience, not the state you can get your system to: I was specifically responding to a claim that the out of the box experience is "great".

[backtoyoujim]

can it send txt messages to a phone ?

[yjftsjthsd-h]

Probably; look at https://kdeconnect.kde.org/ (note that in spite of the branding, you can run it on a non-KDE desktop if desired)

[RunSet]

I have an M2 Macbook Pro mostly gathering dust and waiting until Debian supports it rather than dip so much as a toe into Apple's crass software ecosystem. For now it is a file server, albeit I had to purchase an dongle just to make it run with the lid closed because Apple deemed that an unlikely use case.

[MichaelZuo]

The real question is why is every other company with a consumer OS even more incompetent and/or malicious?

[idunnoman1222]

“ Every other company “

[fsflover]

What's incompetent about Linux? Have you tried to buy preinstalled?

[MichaelZuo]

Have you ever tried to compare something like Ubuntu or RHEL on a per feature per function basis with Mac OS?

There are literally thousands of possible combinations of accessibility features alone, that are vastly more difficult to impossible to access. Or simply don’t exist in any form. Once you add in all the default apps and functions of Mac OS, there’s likely millions of possible combinations that would take a fortune in time and effort and knowledge to replicate maybe a quarter of, on a hypothetical laptop installed with Linux.

Not to mention many peripheral manufacturers for many of their product lines simply don’t officially support any version of Linux released in the past few years.

Edit: Of course 99% of these combinations are irrelevant to any particular individual, but they are all relevant to at least a few small groups.

Linux promoters don’t seem to understand that alienating a few thousand users each time is a big deal if that alienation process happens thousands of times…

[talldayo]

> Have you ever tried to compare something like Ubuntu or RHEL on a per feature per function basis with Mac OS?

Yes? Why would people recommend it as an alternative otherwise?

I used MacOS for 5 years, left after Mojave and came back when an employer made me support MacOS. The current software experience on Mac is genuinely insufferable. Advertisements in your news, notifications begging you to try Safari, zero support for common and Open Source filesystems, constantly broken software packaging, zero useful APIs (what am I supposed to do with Metal???) and a $99/year tax to compensate for the displeasure of supporting developers. You really want to argue Apple cares about you?

As a software developer, what pushed me over the edge was Docker. It runs absolutely terrible on MacOS, consumes resources/battery and makes your CPU hot as satan's taint. Native development is a nightmare on MacOS and you just have to settle with that if you want to defend it as your home. Don't even get me started on how bad Brew is.

> Not to mention many peripheral manufacturers for many of their product lines simply don’t officially support any version of Linux released in the past few years.

If your peripheral manufacturer can't support USB class compliance, they do not deserve money in the first place. I produce music on Linux and haven't ever had a MIDI device or DAC fail to register. It's a standard that even Apple isn't "courageous" enough to reject.

[airstrike]

> As a software developer, what pushed me over the edge was Docker. It runs absolutely terrible on MacOS, consumes resources/battery and makes your CPU hot as satan's taint.

Thanks for saying this. I own an M2 Max Macbook, which is my very first Macbook, and I tried Docker the other day only to find it was literally unplayable.

I then recalled running Docker forever ago on a much shittier Windows laptop and it was sort of a breeze? I was confused as to why I couldn't have the same experience now.

Thanks to you, at least I know this is unlikely to be a case of PEBKAC

[westtan]

Many developers do encounter similar problems when using macOS, especially when developing and running tools like Docker. macOS's resource management and performance issues are often frustrating, especially when you need to do a lot of development work. In fact, you can use other tools instead of Docker instead of Linux. As far as I know, [Servbay](https://servbay.com) does a much better job than Docker on Mac.

[vundercind]

Yeah Docker’s non-native and runs under a virtualized Linux everywhere but… on Linux, so that’s a little rough. I’ve found some of the alternative VM hosts for that to be a ton faster and more power efficient, as they make better use of MacOS’ built-in virtualization system, but YMMV. I’ve also found that Apple’s lead on power management is so great that I can be using a power-sucking thing like Docker and still come out ahead, which is really lame :-/

I hear that “Docker Desktop” is especially bad on MacOS, but I’ve used docker almost as long as it’s existed and still haven’t used that (I don’t really even know what the point of it is?) so dunno about that part.

[justin66]

Power management.

[vundercind]

Windows is still bad at this, too, incredibly. Was initially issued a Lenovo Win10 machine at my current job, decided to give it a shot because I hadn’t used Windows for work in a long time, might have gotten better.

It was using 40% of its battery while “sleeping” over night, and even at full charge wouldn’t get me through a light work day on battery—not even close. Straight back to the battery-anxiety I hadn’t felt since back when I used Windows and Linux on laptops years and years ago. Plus the touchpad is still ass (sorry, never got any good at aiming with the track point, even though I used an IBM Thinkpad for years and years)

Luckily this place will issue a MacBook if you ask nicely. My god, that was a rough few weeks.

[justin66]

> Windows is still bad at this, too, incredibly.

I couldn't agree more. And yet, Linux manages to be worse, since the "at least I can just hibernate" backup plan doesn't even work properly.

[vundercind]

The only time I’ve ever seen Linux disk hibernation actually work about 100% of the time was on an IBM Thinkpad I used to have, and only if I did some arcane magic with a specially-sized-and-designated partition in just the right partition order, because that triggered something in the hardware that let it handle things directly.

[baq]

IME macOS is easily the most broken and user hostile from a professional developer perspective. Maybe I haven't been using it enough, only 2 years.

The hardware is amazing though and no other OS can predictably wake the laptop when opening the lid and not wake it when it's closed, which is kinda a deal breaker for a laptop, so I still use it. Not particularly excited about it, would prefer a Linux laptop if it could sleep reliably. (Seen pictures of a framework laptop with a kernel panic after wake, and I was seriously considering getting one.)

[iknowstuff]

it’s very cohesive and stable by comparison to Windows. It’s beautifully designed compared to KDE. It’s most similar to gnome.

if you’re the kinda guy who sees it as user hostile, I’d wager it’s because you refuse to learn the macOS/gnome paradigm and demand things to be how they were on your windows pc 30 years ago.

what os/dwm do u use

[baq]

I'm not talking about how it looks - I don't care. I can find settings I need when the system implements them no problem.

I'm talking about the gimped OS underneath the eye candy:

- docker sucks compared to native Linux (obviously) and WSL2 (less obvious)

- I have to install BetterDisplay (props to the dev btw, great tool) just to make my perfectly good 25x16 144Hz monitor not look like shit

- I have to install a tool to invert my mouse scroll wheel

- I have to install a tool to manage windows in a sane way (sequoia only just started to know how to do that but it's a looong way ahead)

- I have to install a tool to have multiple things in the clipboard

- Sequoia broke the system firewall and it's still not fixed in 15.0.1 (my mac is enterprise issued and it has all the fancy security apps you've all heard about)

I ran out of time to keep going, these are what I'm running into daily. Fortunately there are tools, but every major macOS release breaks some of them.

[ActorNightly]

>It’s beautifully designed

I hope you understand that when you say this, its pretty easy to see that you are solely in the ideological camp of liking Apple, not a rational one.

[iknowstuff]

i’m talking about consistent HID, proper negative space, consistent padding and margins, copy etc rather than visuals. It’s more science than art.

[ActorNightly]

And im talking about the fact that there are people who are perfectly comfortable using tmux and vim, + browser window for most of their work, or something similar like i3wm. They can say that its the best possible UI layout, and their argument is just as valid as yours.

Except they don't claim it as science.

[newdee]

Pot. Kettle. But just Linux for you, right?

[ActorNightly]

Its not about pushing anything alternative as "the best". Its about saying that you prefer Mac OS based on your personal preferences and not trying to make up bullshit objective reasons for it like they are fact of the world, which Apple users tend to do A LOT, and I don't really understand why.

Like I use Windows solely, because I need to run CAD programs, I like to Game, and I use WSL2 for development purposes, and I prefer having everything in one place. But Im not going to make up reasons why its the "best" because it does all of that.

[consteval]

> it’s very cohesive and stable by comparison to Windows

That's an incredibly low bar. Windows 95 is cohesive and stable as compared to Windows.

> It’s beautifully designed compared to KDE

It's beautiful. Designed? I don't know about that. In my experience, it takes significantly less clicks, swipes, or keypresses to perform action in KDE as opposed to pretty much everything.

I consider that good desktop design, because these are tools. Less work = better tool.

> It’s most similar to gnome

Yeah, and Gnome is awful IMO. Some things just can't be done without installing extensions. The workflow is very "my way or the highway". Seemingly simple actions require submenus of submenus. The UI design isn't dense enough, so a bunch of info is just missing.

> refuse to learn the macOS/gnome paradigm

The difference here is I can easily replicate what macOS and gnome have going in KDE. Because KDE is flexible, and those aren't. Why would I though, when I can instead abuse KDE for efficiency gains in workflows? I'd much rather do that.

[westtan]

I personally think that the development experience on Mac is better. I have complained about the poor development environment you mentioned before, but I successfully solved it with some new tools. On Mac, you can use Servbay or mamp to solve this problem. Servbay:https://servbay.com

[ActorNightly]

>and no other OS can predictably wake the laptop when opening the lid and not wake it when it's closed

You can do it in Linux with scripts. I had it on my old laptop when I had Manjaro on it. Basically disable any action on script close, then write a custom service that listens for an event and puts the computer to sleep. Only thing is you have to press the power button to wake it, but it worked well.

In general, I have been using work issues Macs, and I tend to agree - they are pure shit. I wouldn't even call them good hardware. People seem to forget how mac thought it was a good idea to make the esc button a virtual one on the touchbar. I had 3 work replacements, first one fried chip due to an "incompatible" usbc hub, the other 2 started swelling batteries. In every single case, I ended up losing a small amount of work I haven't backed up (like a shell script), since you can't replace the hard drives.

Currently on the latest iteration of MBP 14 inch, the hardware seems good so far. Battery life claims are overrated - with slack, bunch of browser tabs and VSCode I get max 4 hours, but to be fair, this is the lightest laptop that Ive had that can do that (I used to have a much larger Thinkpad that could do CAD for 4 hours on battery)

[ActorNightly]

>cause all operating systems are terrible

This is code words for "Im emotionally invested into my choice for non logical reasons and its very hard for me to admit I have made the wrong choice".

[vundercind]

My choice is also bad. Zero of them are good. All constantly have stupid quality problems or fail to operate as well as they should.

It’s a choice between hamburgers that are 30-50% shit, and one that’s 10% shit. Every single one has way too much shit in it. All of them deserve loud, angry complaints about the amount of shit they contain. But if I must eat a hamburger…

[ActorNightly]

>All constantly have stupid quality problems or fail to operate as well as they should.

And my guess is that your "operate as the should" is probably some very personal opinions about how an OS should function based on your personal workflow, that you assume should be the defacto standard.

But for the sake of the argument, lets just assume that your standard is actually optimal from an efficiency standpoint. In that case, the argument to make in case of Mac would be this: Out of the box, Macs are closer to optimal, but technically Linux is is better because you can customize it to be exactly optimal.

[vundercind]

> Out of the box, Macs are closer to optimal, but technically Linux is is better because you can customize it to be exactly optimal.

If you’ve got a clean solution for getting cmd-style shortcuts so you don’t have to deal with the how-is-this-still-a-thing-in-2024 problem of conflicting shortcuts in terminals, on Linux, I’d love to know what it is. And that’s just the start of it.

[ActorNightly]

>getting cmd-style shortcuts so you don’t have to deal with the how-is-this-still-a-thing-in-2024 problem of conflicting shortcuts in terminals

I can play that game.

Let me know when Mac gets rid of their stupid useless apple and function keys that is somehow still a thing in 2024, to where you have to bend your pinky unnaturally to get to the apple key, and even more so to the control key instead of just combining them in a single key like the rest of the modern world.

And that just the start of it.

[nearting]

And your response is code for "I'm unfamiliar with the concept of oligopolies, and believe that every consumption choice should be based on logic alone." Come on.

[vundercind]

One cause of the problem is that ~99% of the user-facing OS market is steered by three total companies, for sure.

One difficult bit, though, is interoperability. Even absent monopolist BS (and there’s plenty of that) it makes the OS market tend toward winner-take-all.

[ActorNightly]

There is a difference between saying "less than optimal" and "bad" if you are really trying to convey some technical point.

[goodprojection]

Sounds like projection to me. lOl

[ActorNightly]

Nope. Standard human behavior. Plenty of studies done that shows that when you attack peoples opinions, it feels like personal attacks. Peoples opinions are a fundamental part of their ego, and we all have a fundamental drive to self actualize, which translates the active process in ensuring that we are what we believe we are.