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The Apple monoculture is strong with this one. When will trendy developer startups realize other environments exist besides iOSX?
by cogwheel 11y ago
The Apple monoculture is strong with this one. When will trendy developer startups realize other environments exist besides iOSX?
- moonlighter 11y agoWhat's your point? That it's not available for Windows or Linux? The developer behind Quiver is a one-man shop and happens to be an iOS, OS X and web developer. So what?
- cogwheel 11y agoThere seems to be a trend among certain groups of developers to act as if their preferred environment is the only one that exists. Calling this "The Programmer's Notebook" makes it seem like a broadly applicable tool for programmers in general, when it's actually fairly exclusive and specific. There's nothing particularly egregious about this example, but it's part of a larger pattern that is aggravating for any non-kool-aid drinkers. Edit: to be clear, this isn't specifically about Apple's kool-aid, either. I have the same reaction when people assume every developer is or should be active on GitHub and other similar monocultures.
- mcmillion 11y agoSimple solution: Make your own tool for your own preferred platform.
- tvanantwerp 11y agoThat solution doesn't sound very simple, particularly for non-programmers.
- jtreminio 11y ago> Quiver: The Programmer's Notebook
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- zeveb 11y agoI didn't have to: I have emacs, and thousands of people made it for me. I do, of course, customise it for myself.
- Larrikin 11y agoIf this was an actual startup, your point would make sense. But the portfolio is very obviously one guy making tools he personally thought would be useful, polishing them, and then selling them. It isn't fun to create things that you can't actually use, at least in my opinion. I'm sure if he was making a lot more money he wouldn't hesitate to release for other platforms, because he would be able to to hire someone to do the other platforms
- its2complicated 11y agoI think it's fun to create anything, especially if it involves programming by myself, outside of a stupid agile environment with Scrum idiots running around preaching the gospel.
- infinite8s 11y agoThat sounds like a good first person shooter interface to Scrum/Kanban.
- spdustin 11y agoReSharper and Visual Studio should be OS X compatible, it's not like every developer is using Windows. Such a monoculture. See? It goes both ways (which, from your edit, I know you understand, but it's work a specific example). This guy's labor of love is a well crafted, thoughtful application for programmers using OS X. There is zero controversy there. Same with any other OS X-only application that Windows or (Li|U)nix users want. When we beg for cross-platform apps from developers who don't understand all those platforms, we end up with web-browser-as-platform Electron-based apps that bundle a browser to render their UI layer. Sometimes that's done well (Visual Studio Code is quite nice) - often it's just okay bordering on slow. In fact, it's so rare that high-speed apps are available in some native form for multiple people platforms, I consider it a special gift to use one (Sublime Text comes to mind). Let's not stifle the creativity and drive that small or single-person developer shops have by suggesting - even passively - that we are entitled to three OS-specific builds of anything they write.
- cogwheel 11y agoIf ReSharper was called "The Programmer's Refactoring Suite" or if Visual Studio were called "The Programmer's IDE" I would see your point. I'm not simply referring to the decision to target a particular platform. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with having a narrow focus. But please stop pretending it's anything but a narrow focus.
- infinite8s 11y agoIn what way does ReSharper or Visual Studio communicate Windows only?
- cogwheel 11y agoYou seem to have missed my point. It's what those names don't communicate that makes them better. They don't make it seem like they're more broadly applicable than they are. That said, the "sharp" in "resharper" actually does hint at its Microsoft nature, as it's the same sharp in "csharp"
- 11y ago
- brazzledazzle 11y agoI thought you were being overly negative but perhaps had a point about HN. But this is all over the guy's sales pitch on his product page? You're reading way too much into it. It's one thing to complain about a monoculture in a community but another thing entirely to expect a product page to laden itself with anything except for pitching a product as best it can.
- cogwheel 11y agoHuh? No, it's not about that. Not sure where you got this idea, given my other responses.
- brazzledazzle 11y agoActually I made the comment before that change. But I think I understand why I interpreted your statement that way. The software's page itself says "The Programmer's Notebook" as the page's subtitle and the software's tagline. Presumably whoever submitted it (unless it's the author) probably copied and pasted it. Sorry about that.
- cogwheel 11y agoOh I see. The title of this post didn't say "for OSX" originally.
- sergiotapia 11y agoNobody owes you anything. You want something google it, or build it yourself. Don't you dare belittle a developer for only targeting one platform.
- jsutton 11y ago"Monocultures" develop because people don't want a fragmented and confusing workflow. One might use a Macbook because more useful tools are on OSX, and in turn might create more tools for OSX, enticing similar users to use OSX, and so on. You don't have to be active on Github; maybe you can be active on Bitbucket, but you won't get a fraction of the eyes or feedback as you would on Github.
- cogwheel 11y agoSo you're defending monocultures as virtuous? OK then. Don't feel like arguing that point... But you're also ignoring the massive amounts of money and legal effort made by, e.g. Apple, in order to guarantee that such a monoculture develops. You have to willfully ignore things (like their choice to make non-Apple text messages green instead of blue) in order to claim that it came about organically. There is a concerted effort to create an us vs. them mentality, which always sucks for "them." Obv. the same isn't true for GitHub., but I don't want to argue the (de)merits of monocultures in general. I take for granted in this thread that they're a bad thing.
- danellis 11y agoI think his point is that if someone writes something, he's entitled to be able to use it on his preferred platform. Or, at least, that's how it comes across.
- cogwheel 11y agoThen you didn't read any of my follow-ups.
- jessaustin 11y agoThanks for saving me some time!
- CodexArcanum 11y agoSpeaking of monoculture: people on other OS could always check out emacs org-mode! The Babel component of it allows one to similarly mix code into theirs notes. I've been getting good use out of it lately for doing presentations.
- falcolas 11y agoFor the vimmers out there, I also suggest looking into vimwiki. Not quite the same as org mode, but a good 80% solution which is integrated nicely into vim.
- mih 11y agoI hope people start including information on platforms when posting apps that are not cross-platform. Some hint such as 'OSX only', 'iOS only' or 'Windows only' in the title would help uninterested ones among us tone down our expectations or avoid the topic altogether.
- YngwieMalware 11y agoDamn, you've really opened my eyes to all these other environments that exist besides iOSX. I'm crying now because you've lit the way for me, and I feel so foolish for all the work I've accomplished in my monocultural environment.
- oneeyedpigeon 11y agoIf it's any consolation, there are plenty of games that are available ahead of time, or only, on PC. I happen to prefer the balance afforded by running OSX, but you're entirely welcome to make that decision however you want.
- diego_moita 11y agoI agree. This thread is a party for Apple fans to massage their egos. For Windows/Linux there are plenty of better alternatives: tiddlywiki, OneNote, etc.
- mirekrusin 11y agoOneNote is available for OSX from Mac App Store. And it's simply the best app in this category for me. It's also free. Much better than Quiver. If Quiver had similar, simple, fast editing capabilities it could be better - by feeling less heavy, lighter plus maybe some extras for programmers.
- st3v3r 11y agoI could say the same thing for a lot of stuff that's Windows only.
- eddieroger 11y agoHow lucky you are to not remember when all software was Windows or bust. Talk about a monoculture. Users of anything that wasn't a Windows box were outcasts.
- mrmondo 11y agoFrom what I see in Melbourne at least, most Devs and iOS people use OS-X, if they're not using that they're running fedora or arch. I'm yet to see anyone run Windows other than project managers in places I've worked over the last 4 or so years.