12 ms·

2/3s of all PR activity on Github is on a Mac, for what it's worth. Certainly the platform punches above its weight relative to market share. https://developer

by npunt 9y ago

2/3s of all PR activity on Github is on a Mac, for what it's worth. Certainly the platform punches above its weight relative to market share. https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2017/102/?time=2023 https://developer.apple.com/videos/play/wwdc2017/102/?time=2...

deathanatos 9y ago
My last couple of jobs have given me no choice aside from a MBP and OS X. They do this because they don't want to manage multiple kinds of machines from an IT perspective. (I'm not sure I agree with this, but it is what it is.) Depending on how widespread this is, usage may not reflect actual user desire (though I would wager quite a large number of users either don't care what they're using, or care, but a MBP is adequate, but would also be fine on something else.)
- ggg9990 9y ago
  The managing multiple kinds of machines issues is a real one, speaking from the other end. For uniquely talented software engineers I might let them use what they want but from managing an IT department you definitely want anyone who has no reason to be otherwise on the same exact hardware and software configuration.
  - tetha 9y ago
    Yeah, at my last place, the deal was: First we have to find 5 - 10 devs who want to switch to linux (there were 50 - 100 in total). Then we get a PXE boot image to install linux and, well, DHCP. We get to try it for a couple of month, while producing documentation on how linux works with the infrastructure. That feels like a fair solution.
- stiGGG 9y ago
  In my second to last company (a web development shop), they had originally the policy that a new developers can choose if he want either a mac, linux or windows machine. When i arrived there it was 75% mac and the rest used linux, not even one had made the choice for windows. After a while some new guys get hired and one of them wanted to use windows. We found out immediately, that this caused a lot of problems, because he had serious problems to get our projects to run under windows, even though we thought this shouldn't be an issue because all the dev environments were running in VMs managed by vagrant. After while ago watching this guy not getting productive, because he ran from one issue into another, cto forced him to install linux on his machine to end this horror show and windows was removed from the new guys choices at least for developers. The company i went after that and my current one are 100% mac environments, for the reasons of homogeneity you mentioned.
  - walshemj 9y ago
    What was the problem just install an xwindows server (the new bash environment should support it) or just turn on the telnet clinet.
    - rapind 9y ago
      The new bash env is a bit of a let down for development currently, at least for me. I love this move by MS though and am willing to give it another go in the future once it’s more complete.
  - voltagex_ 9y ago
    I guess from a business point of view it makes sense, but I really get frustrated when I find an open source project that's completely unbuildable on Windows. Maybe the developer in question would have been better using a manually created VM or WSL?
    - bluedino 9y ago
      A windows developer just needs to create a build
    - eptcyka 9y ago
      Now, take this with a grain of salt, as I'm no open source maintainer, and I only rarely use Windows, and even then for development. Up until very recently, to get real developer tools that are supported by Microsoft one had to buy visual studio. VS2017 has a community edition that's usable for open source projects. Not to mention, the windows environment is completely different to linux and OSX. Until x64, they had a different calling convention. On OSX and linux, also until recently, I could use the same compiler for both platforms and still be supported by the platform vendor. All of these non-trivial differences make it a lot more resource-intensive to support a codebase on windows that already runs on Linux and OSX. Asides from my work VMs, I don't even have a windows device that I could use for development. So to me, it's no surprise that most open source projects don't build on Windows.
- reaperducer 9y ago
  > My last couple of jobs have given me no choice aside from a MBP and OS X. They do this because they don't want to manage multiple kinds of machines from an IT perspective. Not that many years ago that was the same reason IT departments would give for only giving people Windows machines.
  - yellow_postit 9y ago
    Apple shot themselves in the foot for this market with the touch bar. It adds such a small amount of utility for annoying every VIM user.
    - jen20 9y ago
      15 year VI and VIM user here. This is a stupid complaint: anyone seriously using VIM remapped Escape a long time ago, or learned to use Ctrl+[.
      - squiggleblaz 9y ago
        I've been using vim seriously for years, and I've had escape on capslock for many of them. However, not all users know how to do that or haven't thought of the amazing benefits that can be obtained. There's people who are only picking up vim today. Give them a chance. To those who haven't: Give it a go. Put Escape on Caps lock. If you've got Control there and you're running Linux or Windows with a standard PC keyboard, you probably actually want to swap Control and Alt. If you haven't, you probably want to swap Control and Alt anyway. (This will give you bindings similar to the Mac's Command key. The thumb is a much stronger finger and far more suited to these combinations than the weak pinky.)
    - tekromancr 9y ago
      I got lucky on that one! I have been remapping caps lock to escape for years now on every machine I use. It's great, until I need to use literally anybody else's machine.
      - 9y ago
- matwood 9y ago
  > My last couple of jobs have given me no choice aside from a MBP and OS X. They do this because they don't want to manage multiple kinds of machines from an IT perspective. This is a huge improvement over when I started developing and was forced to use Windows.
bb88 9y ago
My only complaint is that if the mac were truly a developer-centric device, I wouldn't need homebrew to install software. It should just be in the apple store for me to download.
- rubyn00bie 9y ago
  I think that'd be a disservice to both developers and non-developers alike. It'd clutter the app store and force developers to use the app store and whatever approval process they decide. I think it would be cumbersome to say the least... * Would you have to install through the app store gui? * How would it manage dependency chains and conflicts (system ruby vs local ruby)? * How about explicit paths or build parameters? * How would it handle different shells? I know other operating systems do this but I've never liked it... I guess I just don't mind installing and managing command line/developer tools from a terminal window ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ And, with all that said, I have a quite a bit of negative sentiment towards Apple lately for their hardware and platform choices. So I would still say, it's not a developer-centric platform (the Mac)...
  - bb88 9y ago
    > Would you have to install through the app store gui? Possibly or not. Ubuntu gives me both a gui and a command line option for apt. Thinking about being able to type "app-store install openssh" gives me goosebumps. > How would it manage dependency chains and conflicts (system ruby vs local ruby)? First, that example is a problem for ruby, not for the package manager. Second, software can be in the store statically compiled. Third, apt handles dep management really well. Perhaps that's something apple can learn from? > How about explicit paths or build parameters? This is a solved problem in ubuntu. > How would it handle different shells? Again, this is a solved problem. > So I would still say, it's not a developer-centric platform (the Mac) The question I have is if we deploy on linux, why are we using a mac to develop software on?
    - Pengwin 9y ago
      As someone who lives on linux and has to touch OSX for things like building for iOS devices, I find it really odd that OSX doesnt just solve these problems like all the FOSS distros do. It's insanely odd that Apple gives me a bash shell which is years out of date, and it feels hacky to just use what i want. I know Propietary and free software kinda have a hard time co-existing on operating systems built on free or mostly free software, but if OSX is half free software and its posix compliant, Its hard to believe that apple couldn't give you both propietary software and an easy package system for developers easily. The sad thing about linux is that as much as I love it and its ecosystem, i cant recommend it to anyone who wants things to "just work": - X and wayland crash on me all the time on this laptop because of its HiDPI screen and my kinda-works-but-is-wonky fixes to work with multiple monitors. - Hardware support is the best its ever been, but graphics cards, wifi, exotic devices, laptop power states and embedded devices can still be a pain because manufacturers simply dont care. - desktop applications can still be a little glitchy, Web browsers work fine, as do first party DE apps, but the more you get away from things which arent in the big name gui toolkits and have custom controls and behaviour, the more problems you seem to run in. But aside from all that im happy here in ubuntu. When your software library feels as easy as picking a book from a shelf and 90% of the system updates by the update manager and says "hey restart when you feel like it" Im quite comfortable.
ironjunkie 9y ago
probably related to the fact that the top language on Github is javascript. If you do anything else than UI scripts, I would agree with the above and say you are better off with a linux box.
- bb88 9y ago
  I think you're probably right. I feel like the one thing Mac is really good for is writing the porcelain. node.js came out of the porcelain side, so it seems to fit really well there too. When you get into plumbing, I feel like there are better alternatives.
- sno0ks 9y ago
  Yes that, plus it could be that MacBook/Pros are popular with students: many of whom create lots of tiny Hello World etc repos.
Vel0cityX 9y ago
That's because most GitHub activity is by frontend web devs. What about the rest of the world.
- briandear 9y ago
  Those stats also don’t include GitHub Enterprise..
_emacsomancer_ 9y ago
Do you have a non-video source on this? 2/3s seems really high.
nunez 9y ago
I don't trust that for two reasons: 1) There is a lot of cargo-culting around the MacBook because hurr durr Windows is terribad (though, to be fair, Docker does work better natively with OS X than Windows, even under WSL), and 2) Most companies give their developers the choice of a MacBook or the shittiest Windows machines known to man (because of irresistable volume deals from Windows OEMs). I bet the spread would be more even if companies were willing to offer the Surface Book as an option. This laptop is nice.
- mcny 9y ago
  Satisfaction rate among surface owners is abysmal. At this point, I'd call the surface brand a failed experiment.
  - tluyben2 9y ago
    I was going to say; most people I know brought them back for many reasons. One of my Windows fan friends had a surface book 2 and brought it back for repair because of random battery life a few times; ended up buying a Lenovo T470 (I think) instead as they kept insisting it was his fault instead of the glitchy laptop. No issues with the Lenovo ofcourse.
  - hvidgaard 9y ago
    The first year was a really bad. Plain and simple. Now it is a decent device, but I'd take a Lenovo today if I had to make the choice. However, for note taking, the Surface Pro is second to none. The form factor, pen, and OneNote is a really good combo.
    - ximeng 9y ago
      Until the screen breaks and you can’t turn it on...
      - hvidgaard 9y ago
        If that kind failure recovery is important, then no tightly integrated device is a good choice.
gilbetron 9y ago
That really is "2/3s of all PR activity on Github is unix-based". People don't use Macs to develop on because of OS X, but because it is unix-based. Sounds like they are going to iOS based which makes a Mac much less interesting to develop on for anything but iOS devices.
wetpaws 9y ago
That does not mean anything. People can use Macs for development and still be miserable. I am practically the only Dev in my company using non-mac laptop, the amount of envy in people eyes is astonishing.

by npunt 9y ago

deathanatos 9y ago

My last couple of jobs have given me no choice aside from a MBP and OS X. They do this because they don't want to manage multiple kinds of machines from an IT perspective. (I'm not sure I agree with this, but it is what it is.) Depending on how widespread this is, usage may not reflect actual user desire (though I would wager quite a large number of users either don't care what they're using, or care, but a MBP is adequate, but would also be fine on something else.)

ggg9990 9y ago
The managing multiple kinds of machines issues is a real one, speaking from the other end. For uniquely talented software engineers I might let them use what they want but from managing an IT department you definitely want anyone who has no reason to be otherwise on the same exact hardware and software configuration.
- tetha 9y ago
  Yeah, at my last place, the deal was: First we have to find 5 - 10 devs who want to switch to linux (there were 50 - 100 in total). Then we get a PXE boot image to install linux and, well, DHCP. We get to try it for a couple of month, while producing documentation on how linux works with the infrastructure. That feels like a fair solution.
stiGGG 9y ago
In my second to last company (a web development shop), they had originally the policy that a new developers can choose if he want either a mac, linux or windows machine. When i arrived there it was 75% mac and the rest used linux, not even one had made the choice for windows. After a while some new guys get hired and one of them wanted to use windows. We found out immediately, that this caused a lot of problems, because he had serious problems to get our projects to run under windows, even though we thought this shouldn't be an issue because all the dev environments were running in VMs managed by vagrant. After while ago watching this guy not getting productive, because he ran from one issue into another, cto forced him to install linux on his machine to end this horror show and windows was removed from the new guys choices at least for developers. The company i went after that and my current one are 100% mac environments, for the reasons of homogeneity you mentioned.
- walshemj 9y ago
  What was the problem just install an xwindows server (the new bash environment should support it) or just turn on the telnet clinet.
  - rapind 9y ago
    The new bash env is a bit of a let down for development currently, at least for me. I love this move by MS though and am willing to give it another go in the future once it’s more complete.
- voltagex_ 9y ago
  I guess from a business point of view it makes sense, but I really get frustrated when I find an open source project that's completely unbuildable on Windows. Maybe the developer in question would have been better using a manually created VM or WSL?
  - bluedino 9y ago
    A windows developer just needs to create a build
  - eptcyka 9y ago
    Now, take this with a grain of salt, as I'm no open source maintainer, and I only rarely use Windows, and even then for development. Up until very recently, to get real developer tools that are supported by Microsoft one had to buy visual studio. VS2017 has a community edition that's usable for open source projects. Not to mention, the windows environment is completely different to linux and OSX. Until x64, they had a different calling convention. On OSX and linux, also until recently, I could use the same compiler for both platforms and still be supported by the platform vendor. All of these non-trivial differences make it a lot more resource-intensive to support a codebase on windows that already runs on Linux and OSX. Asides from my work VMs, I don't even have a windows device that I could use for development. So to me, it's no surprise that most open source projects don't build on Windows.
reaperducer 9y ago
> My last couple of jobs have given me no choice aside from a MBP and OS X. They do this because they don't want to manage multiple kinds of machines from an IT perspective. Not that many years ago that was the same reason IT departments would give for only giving people Windows machines.
- yellow_postit 9y ago
  Apple shot themselves in the foot for this market with the touch bar. It adds such a small amount of utility for annoying every VIM user.
  - jen20 9y ago
    15 year VI and VIM user here. This is a stupid complaint: anyone seriously using VIM remapped Escape a long time ago, or learned to use Ctrl+[.
    - squiggleblaz 9y ago
      I've been using vim seriously for years, and I've had escape on capslock for many of them. However, not all users know how to do that or haven't thought of the amazing benefits that can be obtained. There's people who are only picking up vim today. Give them a chance. To those who haven't: Give it a go. Put Escape on Caps lock. If you've got Control there and you're running Linux or Windows with a standard PC keyboard, you probably actually want to swap Control and Alt. If you haven't, you probably want to swap Control and Alt anyway. (This will give you bindings similar to the Mac's Command key. The thumb is a much stronger finger and far more suited to these combinations than the weak pinky.)
  - tekromancr 9y ago
    I got lucky on that one! I have been remapping caps lock to escape for years now on every machine I use. It's great, until I need to use literally anybody else's machine.
    - 9y ago
matwood 9y ago
> My last couple of jobs have given me no choice aside from a MBP and OS X. They do this because they don't want to manage multiple kinds of machines from an IT perspective. This is a huge improvement over when I started developing and was forced to use Windows.

bb88 9y ago

My only complaint is that if the mac were truly a developer-centric device, I wouldn't need homebrew to install software. It should just be in the apple store for me to download.

rubyn00bie 9y ago
I think that'd be a disservice to both developers and non-developers alike. It'd clutter the app store and force developers to use the app store and whatever approval process they decide. I think it would be cumbersome to say the least... * Would you have to install through the app store gui? * How would it manage dependency chains and conflicts (system ruby vs local ruby)? * How about explicit paths or build parameters? * How would it handle different shells? I know other operating systems do this but I've never liked it... I guess I just don't mind installing and managing command line/developer tools from a terminal window ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ And, with all that said, I have a quite a bit of negative sentiment towards Apple lately for their hardware and platform choices. So I would still say, it's not a developer-centric platform (the Mac)...
- bb88 9y ago
  > Would you have to install through the app store gui? Possibly or not. Ubuntu gives me both a gui and a command line option for apt. Thinking about being able to type "app-store install openssh" gives me goosebumps. > How would it manage dependency chains and conflicts (system ruby vs local ruby)? First, that example is a problem for ruby, not for the package manager. Second, software can be in the store statically compiled. Third, apt handles dep management really well. Perhaps that's something apple can learn from? > How about explicit paths or build parameters? This is a solved problem in ubuntu. > How would it handle different shells? Again, this is a solved problem. > So I would still say, it's not a developer-centric platform (the Mac) The question I have is if we deploy on linux, why are we using a mac to develop software on?
  - Pengwin 9y ago
    As someone who lives on linux and has to touch OSX for things like building for iOS devices, I find it really odd that OSX doesnt just solve these problems like all the FOSS distros do. It's insanely odd that Apple gives me a bash shell which is years out of date, and it feels hacky to just use what i want. I know Propietary and free software kinda have a hard time co-existing on operating systems built on free or mostly free software, but if OSX is half free software and its posix compliant, Its hard to believe that apple couldn't give you both propietary software and an easy package system for developers easily. The sad thing about linux is that as much as I love it and its ecosystem, i cant recommend it to anyone who wants things to "just work": - X and wayland crash on me all the time on this laptop because of its HiDPI screen and my kinda-works-but-is-wonky fixes to work with multiple monitors. - Hardware support is the best its ever been, but graphics cards, wifi, exotic devices, laptop power states and embedded devices can still be a pain because manufacturers simply dont care. - desktop applications can still be a little glitchy, Web browsers work fine, as do first party DE apps, but the more you get away from things which arent in the big name gui toolkits and have custom controls and behaviour, the more problems you seem to run in. But aside from all that im happy here in ubuntu. When your software library feels as easy as picking a book from a shelf and 90% of the system updates by the update manager and says "hey restart when you feel like it" Im quite comfortable.

ironjunkie 9y ago

probably related to the fact that the top language on Github is javascript. If you do anything else than UI scripts, I would agree with the above and say you are better off with a linux box.

bb88 9y ago
I think you're probably right. I feel like the one thing Mac is really good for is writing the porcelain. node.js came out of the porcelain side, so it seems to fit really well there too. When you get into plumbing, I feel like there are better alternatives.
sno0ks 9y ago
Yes that, plus it could be that MacBook/Pros are popular with students: many of whom create lots of tiny Hello World etc repos.

Vel0cityX 9y ago

That's because most GitHub activity is by frontend web devs. What about the rest of the world.

briandear 9y ago
Those stats also don’t include GitHub Enterprise..

_emacsomancer_ 9y ago

Do you have a non-video source on this? 2/3s seems really high.

nunez 9y ago

I don't trust that for two reasons: 1) There is a lot of cargo-culting around the MacBook because hurr durr Windows is terribad (though, to be fair, Docker does work better natively with OS X than Windows, even under WSL), and 2) Most companies give their developers the choice of a MacBook or the shittiest Windows machines known to man (because of irresistable volume deals from Windows OEMs). I bet the spread would be more even if companies were willing to offer the Surface Book as an option. This laptop is nice.

mcny 9y ago
Satisfaction rate among surface owners is abysmal. At this point, I'd call the surface brand a failed experiment.
- tluyben2 9y ago
  I was going to say; most people I know brought them back for many reasons. One of my Windows fan friends had a surface book 2 and brought it back for repair because of random battery life a few times; ended up buying a Lenovo T470 (I think) instead as they kept insisting it was his fault instead of the glitchy laptop. No issues with the Lenovo ofcourse.
- hvidgaard 9y ago
  The first year was a really bad. Plain and simple. Now it is a decent device, but I'd take a Lenovo today if I had to make the choice. However, for note taking, the Surface Pro is second to none. The form factor, pen, and OneNote is a really good combo.
  - ximeng 9y ago
    Until the screen breaks and you can’t turn it on...
    - hvidgaard 9y ago
      If that kind failure recovery is important, then no tightly integrated device is a good choice.

gilbetron 9y ago

That really is "2/3s of all PR activity on Github is unix-based". People don't use Macs to develop on because of OS X, but because it is unix-based. Sounds like they are going to iOS based which makes a Mac much less interesting to develop on for anything but iOS devices.

wetpaws 9y ago

That does not mean anything. People can use Macs for development and still be miserable. I am practically the only Dev in my company using non-mac laptop, the amount of envy in people eyes is astonishing.