7 ms·

> So, the appeal of Mac emulation is very limited, because it starts out with tinkering. There are countless of utilities for tinkering with you mac setup and

by patrec 8y ago

> So, the appeal of Mac emulation is very limited, because it starts out with tinkering. There are countless of utilities for tinkering with you mac setup and the best and most tinker-y terminal for any platform is a mac-only app (iterm2). It's just that macOS starts out with a far high usability level without tinkering and comes with lots of basic stuff working that no amount of tinkering will ever give you with linux (like you can actually find files on your computer, good luck doing that with linux). And of course even if your premise were true, there are plenty of reasons people would like to run macOS apps under linux: - lots of good software is mac only - automated testing with macs is a pain and expensive, doing at least some with linux boxes would be a pretty decent win.

ncmncm 8y ago
The facts remain that (1) even Free-Software developers rarely tinker with their Macs, (2) what can be achieved by tinkering is extremely limited, and (3) vanishingly few who don't own a Mac have the slightest idea of, or interest in, what MacOS apps they might (someday) be able to run. What would the results of a successful or unsuccessful test mean? Either might be a consequence of the different environment. I have no difficulty locating files. They stay right where I put them. If storage did not keep growing it might bother me that they never fade away. All that said, a few Mac owners, and even some former owners, might have a use for emulation, and I would never begrudge it to them.
laumars 8y ago
> There are countless of utilities for tinkering with you mac setup and the best and most tinker-y terminal for any platform is a mac-only app (iterm2). It's just that macOS starts out with a far high usability level without tinkering and comes with lots of basic stuff working that no amount of tinkering will ever give you with linux I was with you right up until you made the cheap shot at Linux. That was as unnecessary as it was untrue. > (like you can actually find files on your computer, good luck doing that with linux) Linux is no harder to find files on than it is on OS X. They have the same CLI tools, they both has desktop environments that support file indexing and rapid searching (eg Spotlight). And on Linux that all gets installed by default with the desktop environment - just as it does on OS X too. So they really aren't all that different. > lots of good software is mac only I agree. But there is also lots of good software on Linux too. In all my years of running Linux and OS X the only Mac-only application I've missed on other platforms is Logic. But even there, we're talking 15 years ago and Linux has come a long, long way since in terms of the quality of DAWs available on it.
- patrec 8y ago
  > I was with you right up until you made the cheap shot at Linux. That was as unnecessary as it was untrue. Here are some concrete examples: - macOS has essentially a single set of efficient and consistent keybindings that works everywhere. Command line and GUI work essentially the same, i can use emacs style navigation with C-a C-e C-f C-b etc. everywhere. I can copy with Cmd-C and paste with Cmd-V in my terminal. The geniuses who created the first mainstream Linux GUI paradigms decided to copy windows and go with Control as the main key modifier to create a set of clashing keybindings for GUI and console. - file history (If I messed something up in my keynote presentation, I can easily compare previous versions and restore what's needed) - Cmd-? allows you to access any menu item quickly by search, how do I do that on Linux? - finding files (see below) - MacOS can recover from memory pressure fine. How do I get my linux machine not to effectively crash if I run an app that happens to use too much memory (technically it just swaps itself to death, in practice reset is the only remotely timely way to recover)? I've tried any amount of tweaking, but turns out that you can't turn off overcommit and swap completely, even if have lots of memory, things will just break randomly (chrome for example). > Linux is no harder to find files on than it is on OS X. Can you point me at something on linux that comes anywhere close to spotlight/mdfind? On of the reasons spotlight works well is file system integration, to the best of my knowledge nothing on linux does that. It's trivial to open a file by recency or contents or type (or tags or ...) from the open dialogue of any application on macOS, how do I do that on linux? If I want to find all mp4 videos of 1000x1000 resolution that I modified within the last week, or all jpeg files with sRGB color profile, I can do so instantaneously with mdfind. That is not to say that linux isn't more ergonomic for certain things, but in my experience they tend to be mostly limited to things only programmers would care about (/proc is the number one thing I miss on a mac; some commandline utilities are also nicer on linux, but you can normally install them easily enough on macs as well). For what it's worth: I'm using both linux and macOS daily and am both productive and reasonably expert with both.
  - snazz 8y ago
    Re. keybindings: you can change your default GTK bindings to Emacs-style if you want to. Whether the super/Windows/Command key should be used for window management or application controls is still up for debate; it always bothers me whenever I have to use a Mac that some browser bindings are already taken by the WM/OS because Cmd is shared between apps and the OS. There are very few bindings that you can’t change on Linux or another non-Mac Unix-like. Re. file history: use real version control or a filesystem with this functionality (I imagine that ZFS would). Better to just use Git. Re. Cmd-?: no alternative exists that I know of. However, menu bars are usually less prevalent on software written for traditional Unix than on a Mac. Re. Finding files: GNOME does this with the search bar OOTB it appears. Otherwise, use search in Nautilus like you would in Finder. Re. Memory presssure: search “swappiness Linux” into a search engine. Do you prefer maximum available memory or responsiveness? Linux gives you the choice here. Recency, contents and type can all be sorted with Nautilus on GNOME. I’m not aware of a way to find very specific files that meet your search query quite like you mentioned (although I’m sure they exist). I would pipe file into grep personally, but that’s probably too rudimentary for what you want.
xondono 8y ago
I would pay a decent amount just to get Omnifocus working on windows and linux machines.
- Veen 8y ago
  Omni has just released a beta web app, which you will have to pay a decent amount for (it's a subscription service). https://test.omnifocus.com https://test.omnifocus.com
  - xondono 8y ago
    You have earned yourself a virtual high five, and a redeemable beer if we ever met in person :) Thank you for showing this to me.

by patrec 8y ago

ncmncm 8y ago

The facts remain that (1) even Free-Software developers rarely tinker with their Macs, (2) what can be achieved by tinkering is extremely limited, and (3) vanishingly few who don't own a Mac have the slightest idea of, or interest in, what MacOS apps they might (someday) be able to run. What would the results of a successful or unsuccessful test mean? Either might be a consequence of the different environment. I have no difficulty locating files. They stay right where I put them. If storage did not keep growing it might bother me that they never fade away. All that said, a few Mac owners, and even some former owners, might have a use for emulation, and I would never begrudge it to them.

laumars 8y ago

> There are countless of utilities for tinkering with you mac setup and the best and most tinker-y terminal for any platform is a mac-only app (iterm2). It's just that macOS starts out with a far high usability level without tinkering and comes with lots of basic stuff working that no amount of tinkering will ever give you with linux I was with you right up until you made the cheap shot at Linux. That was as unnecessary as it was untrue. > (like you can actually find files on your computer, good luck doing that with linux) Linux is no harder to find files on than it is on OS X. They have the same CLI tools, they both has desktop environments that support file indexing and rapid searching (eg Spotlight). And on Linux that all gets installed by default with the desktop environment - just as it does on OS X too. So they really aren't all that different. > lots of good software is mac only I agree. But there is also lots of good software on Linux too. In all my years of running Linux and OS X the only Mac-only application I've missed on other platforms is Logic. But even there, we're talking 15 years ago and Linux has come a long, long way since in terms of the quality of DAWs available on it.

patrec 8y ago
> I was with you right up until you made the cheap shot at Linux. That was as unnecessary as it was untrue. Here are some concrete examples: - macOS has essentially a single set of efficient and consistent keybindings that works everywhere. Command line and GUI work essentially the same, i can use emacs style navigation with C-a C-e C-f C-b etc. everywhere. I can copy with Cmd-C and paste with Cmd-V in my terminal. The geniuses who created the first mainstream Linux GUI paradigms decided to copy windows and go with Control as the main key modifier to create a set of clashing keybindings for GUI and console. - file history (If I messed something up in my keynote presentation, I can easily compare previous versions and restore what's needed) - Cmd-? allows you to access any menu item quickly by search, how do I do that on Linux? - finding files (see below) - MacOS can recover from memory pressure fine. How do I get my linux machine not to effectively crash if I run an app that happens to use too much memory (technically it just swaps itself to death, in practice reset is the only remotely timely way to recover)? I've tried any amount of tweaking, but turns out that you can't turn off overcommit and swap completely, even if have lots of memory, things will just break randomly (chrome for example). > Linux is no harder to find files on than it is on OS X. Can you point me at something on linux that comes anywhere close to spotlight/mdfind? On of the reasons spotlight works well is file system integration, to the best of my knowledge nothing on linux does that. It's trivial to open a file by recency or contents or type (or tags or ...) from the open dialogue of any application on macOS, how do I do that on linux? If I want to find all mp4 videos of 1000x1000 resolution that I modified within the last week, or all jpeg files with sRGB color profile, I can do so instantaneously with mdfind. That is not to say that linux isn't more ergonomic for certain things, but in my experience they tend to be mostly limited to things only programmers would care about (/proc is the number one thing I miss on a mac; some commandline utilities are also nicer on linux, but you can normally install them easily enough on macs as well). For what it's worth: I'm using both linux and macOS daily and am both productive and reasonably expert with both.
- snazz 8y ago
  Re. keybindings: you can change your default GTK bindings to Emacs-style if you want to. Whether the super/Windows/Command key should be used for window management or application controls is still up for debate; it always bothers me whenever I have to use a Mac that some browser bindings are already taken by the WM/OS because Cmd is shared between apps and the OS. There are very few bindings that you can’t change on Linux or another non-Mac Unix-like. Re. file history: use real version control or a filesystem with this functionality (I imagine that ZFS would). Better to just use Git. Re. Cmd-?: no alternative exists that I know of. However, menu bars are usually less prevalent on software written for traditional Unix than on a Mac. Re. Finding files: GNOME does this with the search bar OOTB it appears. Otherwise, use search in Nautilus like you would in Finder. Re. Memory presssure: search “swappiness Linux” into a search engine. Do you prefer maximum available memory or responsiveness? Linux gives you the choice here. Recency, contents and type can all be sorted with Nautilus on GNOME. I’m not aware of a way to find very specific files that meet your search query quite like you mentioned (although I’m sure they exist). I would pipe file into grep personally, but that’s probably too rudimentary for what you want.

xondono 8y ago

I would pay a decent amount just to get Omnifocus working on windows and linux machines.

Veen 8y ago
Omni has just released a beta web app, which you will have to pay a decent amount for (it's a subscription service). https://test.omnifocus.com https://test.omnifocus.com
- xondono 8y ago
  You have earned yourself a virtual high five, and a redeemable beer if we ever met in person :) Thank you for showing this to me.