6 ms·

Completely agree with regards the closed platform. I switched to Linux for my development machine for a few years now. And, using something else than i3(or any

by 6d65 6y ago

Completely agree with regards the closed platform. I switched to Linux for my development machine for a few years now. And, using something else than i3(or any other tilling window managers) seems like a step down. I like instant switching between workspaces, splits, no animations. And I'll be looking for a good laptop next year, when everything returns back to normal, and I might have to travel. And will put Linux on it. And agree with regards to aggressive marketing, in my case it makes the brand a bit toxic for my taste.

doggydogs94 6y ago
The last I heard, Linux is not coming to M1 unless Apple opens up on technical specifications.
- my123 6y ago
  https://patreon.com/marcan https://patreon.com/marcan
  - GekkePrutser 6y ago
    The question is how far he can get without Apple's documentation. On the CPU side, probably pretty far as they use the standard ARM ABI. On the GPU side? This is where things will get really hairy. Same with the machine learning cores.
- 6d65 6y ago
  I'm not planning to get a macbook. My main contender would be an XPS with a new ryzen cpu on 5nm, if they'll have one next year, or a thinkpad again with Ryzen 5nm. I would not accept anything less. But thinking about it, it might be that the mobile AMD CPUs are a year behind the desktop ones. So next year the best ryzen could still be at 7nm Zen3. In that case apple will have a 2 year transistor lead. But, will see.
  - tannhaeuser 6y ago
    Is there any statement Dell will build Ryzen XPSs?
    - 6d65 6y ago
      Only wishful thinking from my side. As mentioned in the post, I hope that the M1 performance and aggressive apple marketing will push premium pc laptop manufactures in adopting the best performance x86 CPUs. And I also hope that AMD will seize the opportunity to get a good chunk of mobile market. Of course, next year laptop models are probably being finished right now, and it could be that intel still found a way to bribe premium manufactures from including AMD in their premium models. In my opinion they'll lose marketshare if that happens. But, there are most likely smart people with a lot of more information than me making these decisions.
- Recurecur 6y ago
  Linux should be on it shortly, running in a VM environment. That won't satisfy the purists, but it should satisfy the practical in most cases.
bayindirh 6y ago
I live a double life: Apple for laptops and Linux for desktops (and I'm mostly a Desktop user who manages a lot of Linux servers). Both platforms have their pluses and minuses. I like to carry ideas between them for my development and environments. Found this extremely fruitful for me over the years. We ordered a bunch of M1 airs for portability and power efficiency. Will see how it goes. I personally love both Linux and Apple for laptops but, for the out of the box experience and reliability, Apple is more polished due to integration. My EliteBook has no problems with Linux so far but, when a flawlessly running driver degrades after an update (cough, intel e1000e, cough), it leaves a bad taste in the mouth. OTOH, I'm firstly a Linux guy who prefers and writes GPL software. Of course YMMV.
- 6d65 6y ago
  Yep. Mac's look like a comfortable unixy environment. Preinstalled zsh, a fast terminal emulator (item), gnu utils. I'm sure I could make it work as a dev machine. I have to admit that m1 macbook air battery life is compelling. A long time ago I was thinking about a perfect laptop that would be very light and have a 20+ hours of battery life. This comes close. Even though I have never used a laptop more than 5 hours on battery. And that happens a couple of times a year. Hope you'll enjoy your m1 air.
  - bayindirh 6y ago
    Thank you. I’m really excited about it. Using a different CPU architecture is always exciting. :) Using Mac is like driving an Audi S8. Comfortable, smooth, powerful. However, it's not your hand tuned Impreza which can read your mind while going above 200Km/h. Even an Intel MacBook pro can go a long time on battery (I have a personal Mid2014, configured all-out). I've developed some system-abusing scientific code on it and, it really delivers. The trick for me is, I can make a Mac dev machine without modifying it with homebrew, et. al. I install a Linux VM to VMWare, give it a static IP, install all required tools, servers and services on it. On the macOS side, I use Eclipse for IDE and use clang/llvm for compiling (since I also aim to code which behaves same on both gcc and llvm). I develop on macOS and interface it with Linux VM via network if it's absolutely necessary. Linux VM also hosts some heavy tooling like LaTeX which cannot be installed/updated on macOS very cleanly (I know macTeX. It doesn't play nice with newer macOS, due to Apple's locks on the OS). Then everything becomes transparent for me. Pull -> Develop -> Push in either direction. Eclipse already syncs itself via oomph and cloud. Code is portable, environment is same. It also ensures code compatibility, allows me to see compiler effects and run tests on many platforms. As aforementioned, it also inspires me to write better software. My code carries Apple's sensible defaults and it-works mentality with Linux's flexibility options. This approach allowed me to create a series of utilities for a project in limbo. These small no-setup utilities saved a lot of labor and ultimately saved the project. So yes, apple is a walled garden and it's not optimal but, they do a lot of right things. We can selectively carry them to more open platforms to make them better. Similarly, open platforms' flexibility can be carried to some macOS applications so, the environment better accommodates power users out of the box. Homebrew and other tools are nice but, I don't like to shoehorn stuff which doesn't fit natively into an ecosystem.

by 6d65 6y ago

doggydogs94 6y ago

The last I heard, Linux is not coming to M1 unless Apple opens up on technical specifications.

my123 6y ago
https://patreon.com/marcan https://patreon.com/marcan
- GekkePrutser 6y ago
  The question is how far he can get without Apple's documentation. On the CPU side, probably pretty far as they use the standard ARM ABI. On the GPU side? This is where things will get really hairy. Same with the machine learning cores.
6d65 6y ago
I'm not planning to get a macbook. My main contender would be an XPS with a new ryzen cpu on 5nm, if they'll have one next year, or a thinkpad again with Ryzen 5nm. I would not accept anything less. But thinking about it, it might be that the mobile AMD CPUs are a year behind the desktop ones. So next year the best ryzen could still be at 7nm Zen3. In that case apple will have a 2 year transistor lead. But, will see.
- tannhaeuser 6y ago
  Is there any statement Dell will build Ryzen XPSs?
  - 6d65 6y ago
    Only wishful thinking from my side. As mentioned in the post, I hope that the M1 performance and aggressive apple marketing will push premium pc laptop manufactures in adopting the best performance x86 CPUs. And I also hope that AMD will seize the opportunity to get a good chunk of mobile market. Of course, next year laptop models are probably being finished right now, and it could be that intel still found a way to bribe premium manufactures from including AMD in their premium models. In my opinion they'll lose marketshare if that happens. But, there are most likely smart people with a lot of more information than me making these decisions.
Recurecur 6y ago
Linux should be on it shortly, running in a VM environment. That won't satisfy the purists, but it should satisfy the practical in most cases.

bayindirh 6y ago

I live a double life: Apple for laptops and Linux for desktops (and I'm mostly a Desktop user who manages a lot of Linux servers). Both platforms have their pluses and minuses. I like to carry ideas between them for my development and environments. Found this extremely fruitful for me over the years. We ordered a bunch of M1 airs for portability and power efficiency. Will see how it goes. I personally love both Linux and Apple for laptops but, for the out of the box experience and reliability, Apple is more polished due to integration. My EliteBook has no problems with Linux so far but, when a flawlessly running driver degrades after an update (cough, intel e1000e, cough), it leaves a bad taste in the mouth. OTOH, I'm firstly a Linux guy who prefers and writes GPL software. Of course YMMV.

6d65 6y ago
Yep. Mac's look like a comfortable unixy environment. Preinstalled zsh, a fast terminal emulator (item), gnu utils. I'm sure I could make it work as a dev machine. I have to admit that m1 macbook air battery life is compelling. A long time ago I was thinking about a perfect laptop that would be very light and have a 20+ hours of battery life. This comes close. Even though I have never used a laptop more than 5 hours on battery. And that happens a couple of times a year. Hope you'll enjoy your m1 air.
- bayindirh 6y ago
  Thank you. I’m really excited about it. Using a different CPU architecture is always exciting. :) Using Mac is like driving an Audi S8. Comfortable, smooth, powerful. However, it's not your hand tuned Impreza which can read your mind while going above 200Km/h. Even an Intel MacBook pro can go a long time on battery (I have a personal Mid2014, configured all-out). I've developed some system-abusing scientific code on it and, it really delivers. The trick for me is, I can make a Mac dev machine without modifying it with homebrew, et. al. I install a Linux VM to VMWare, give it a static IP, install all required tools, servers and services on it. On the macOS side, I use Eclipse for IDE and use clang/llvm for compiling (since I also aim to code which behaves same on both gcc and llvm). I develop on macOS and interface it with Linux VM via network if it's absolutely necessary. Linux VM also hosts some heavy tooling like LaTeX which cannot be installed/updated on macOS very cleanly (I know macTeX. It doesn't play nice with newer macOS, due to Apple's locks on the OS). Then everything becomes transparent for me. Pull -> Develop -> Push in either direction. Eclipse already syncs itself via oomph and cloud. Code is portable, environment is same. It also ensures code compatibility, allows me to see compiler effects and run tests on many platforms. As aforementioned, it also inspires me to write better software. My code carries Apple's sensible defaults and it-works mentality with Linux's flexibility options. This approach allowed me to create a series of utilities for a project in limbo. These small no-setup utilities saved a lot of labor and ultimately saved the project. So yes, apple is a walled garden and it's not optimal but, they do a lot of right things. We can selectively carry them to more open platforms to make them better. Similarly, open platforms' flexibility can be carried to some macOS applications so, the environment better accommodates power users out of the box. Homebrew and other tools are nice but, I don't like to shoehorn stuff which doesn't fit natively into an ecosystem.