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> And the reason I can imagine this is because macOS gives you this model (albeit cheating because macOS is essentially Unix). What is the cheat there? That Ma

> And the reason I can imagine this is because macOS gives you this model (albeit cheating because macOS is essentially Unix). What is the cheat there? That MacOS X is a single operating system, where both, command line tools the blog author knows and GUI tools, life in the same world, with da process model and same devices on a single kernel, unlike WSL? How is that cheating? Is my Linux desktop cheating as well?

agustif 6y ago
cheating as in they have much less work to do to implement unix-like linux on the hood because it was already there, and Microsoft actually has to build a port.
- johannes1234321 6y ago
  Where is MacOS implementing Linux? At it's core it is a Unix system (not sure whether they have any recent certification, but doesn't matter) tltonlarge parts following POSIX with a fancy GUI.
  - rbanffy 6y ago
    I wonder if it would be possible to resurrect MkLinux on top of the MacOS Mach kernel. Would doubtlessly be fun.
  - filmgirlcw 6y ago
    Exactly.
- Longhanks 6y ago
  Which was not always the case, up until Mac OS 9 there was no Unix. They delivered with Mac OS X. That’s not cheating, it’s pointing out that Microsoft failed in this regard.
  - rbanffy 6y ago
    MacOS X is not a new version of MacOS 9 - it's renamed OPENSTEP with a MacOS X theme and some parts replaced. It's also very different from most Unixes in that it has a Mach microkernel with a BSD coat of paint. It almost has more in common with NT than it has with Linux. Before that, MacOS had (AFAIK - never seen it myself) the MPW environment that had a Unix-like shell. And A/UX.
    - gpanders 6y ago
      It is POSIX compatible, though, and IMO that is what is actually important for most people/use cases.
      - rbanffy 6y ago
        True, but I wouldn't call it cheating except for having renamed it MacOS. It is officially a Unix.
    - hapless 6y ago
      I don't think it's accurate to call it a "BSD coat of paint." Practically an entire BSD kernel is run as a single "server" in Mach. In Apple's open source release, a majority of the XNU kernel code lies in the "bsd" subdirectory -- Apple's heavily patched 4.3BSD / 4.4BSD / FreeBSD hybrid. Originally the idea was that having most of a BSD kernel running inside Mach would make it easy for researchers to run tools on their research kernel. One suspects NeXT had a simpler motive: They just wanted to avoid paying money to AT&T. I'm not sure they had any particular interest in Mach itself. (Although obviously Mach's strange multi-architecture binary format paid off for them big time, some years later!)
      - rbanffy 6y ago
        Fair enough. It's a load-bearing, rad-shielding, armored, and money-saving coat of paint ;-)
filmgirlcw 6y ago
Well, cheating in that it’s a totally different system, which makes it not a good apples to apples comparison. MacOS is UNIX. Unix and Linux are similar in many ways and plenty of Linux utilities have been ported over or packaged for macOS, the same as any other BSD, but as you say, it’s one kernel and one system with different interface options. It’s not as if you’re having to deal with different file systems or share the same hardware across kernels. A better comparison would be Docker for Mac, which has had several approaches over the years. Originally, Docker Desktop for Mac used VirtualBox in the background to spin up a VM that was then used for containers. It then moved to using HyperKit, which is the more “native” soliton but has downsides, largely around I/O and CPU usage, many of the same problems facing WSL1 and some of the edge cases with WSL2.
- johannes1234321 6y ago
  Docker for Mac however is no Apple Product. Thus nothing Apple can be blamed or praised for (at the most as enabler) And it doesn't fit the requirements they stated: The docker container can't see the host's processes nor can the host see the container's processes. So the suggested "cheat" isn't there either.

agustif 6y ago

cheating as in they have much less work to do to implement unix-like linux on the hood because it was already there, and Microsoft actually has to build a port.

johannes1234321 6y ago
Where is MacOS implementing Linux? At it's core it is a Unix system (not sure whether they have any recent certification, but doesn't matter) tltonlarge parts following POSIX with a fancy GUI.
- rbanffy 6y ago
  I wonder if it would be possible to resurrect MkLinux on top of the MacOS Mach kernel. Would doubtlessly be fun.
- filmgirlcw 6y ago
  Exactly.
Longhanks 6y ago
Which was not always the case, up until Mac OS 9 there was no Unix. They delivered with Mac OS X. That’s not cheating, it’s pointing out that Microsoft failed in this regard.
- rbanffy 6y ago
  MacOS X is not a new version of MacOS 9 - it's renamed OPENSTEP with a MacOS X theme and some parts replaced. It's also very different from most Unixes in that it has a Mach microkernel with a BSD coat of paint. It almost has more in common with NT than it has with Linux. Before that, MacOS had (AFAIK - never seen it myself) the MPW environment that had a Unix-like shell. And A/UX.
  - gpanders 6y ago
    It is POSIX compatible, though, and IMO that is what is actually important for most people/use cases.
    - rbanffy 6y ago
      True, but I wouldn't call it cheating except for having renamed it MacOS. It is officially a Unix.
  - hapless 6y ago
    I don't think it's accurate to call it a "BSD coat of paint." Practically an entire BSD kernel is run as a single "server" in Mach. In Apple's open source release, a majority of the XNU kernel code lies in the "bsd" subdirectory -- Apple's heavily patched 4.3BSD / 4.4BSD / FreeBSD hybrid. Originally the idea was that having most of a BSD kernel running inside Mach would make it easy for researchers to run tools on their research kernel. One suspects NeXT had a simpler motive: They just wanted to avoid paying money to AT&T. I'm not sure they had any particular interest in Mach itself. (Although obviously Mach's strange multi-architecture binary format paid off for them big time, some years later!)
    - rbanffy 6y ago
      Fair enough. It's a load-bearing, rad-shielding, armored, and money-saving coat of paint ;-)

filmgirlcw 6y ago

Well, cheating in that it’s a totally different system, which makes it not a good apples to apples comparison. MacOS is UNIX. Unix and Linux are similar in many ways and plenty of Linux utilities have been ported over or packaged for macOS, the same as any other BSD, but as you say, it’s one kernel and one system with different interface options. It’s not as if you’re having to deal with different file systems or share the same hardware across kernels. A better comparison would be Docker for Mac, which has had several approaches over the years. Originally, Docker Desktop for Mac used VirtualBox in the background to spin up a VM that was then used for containers. It then moved to using HyperKit, which is the more “native” soliton but has downsides, largely around I/O and CPU usage, many of the same problems facing WSL1 and some of the edge cases with WSL2.

johannes1234321 6y ago
Docker for Mac however is no Apple Product. Thus nothing Apple can be blamed or praised for (at the most as enabler) And it doesn't fit the requirements they stated: The docker container can't see the host's processes nor can the host see the container's processes. So the suggested "cheat" isn't there either.